This quick and easy tagliatelle carbonara recipe uses simple ingredients which are combined to make a comforting dinner suitable for any night of the week. Serve with a side salad and lashings of crusty garlic bread.

If you don’t have tagliatelle, you can use spaghetti or linguine in place of the tagliatelle. The sauce clings best to longer types of pasta, but I have seen restaurants use penne instead of tagliatelle.

Ingredients for tagliatelle carbonara

You will need:

• Tagliatelle (or spaghetti or linguine)
• A dash of olive oil or a knob of butter
• Either a small pack of diced pancetta, or a small pack of diced bacon lardons or 3-4 slices of bacon, snipped with scissors into small even-sized pieces. Smoked pancetta, smoked lardons or smoked bacon add more flavour but unsmoked will also work well.
• 3 free-range eggs
• Parmesan cheese, grated (use the parmesan that comes as a block as it has more flavour) if you don’t have parmesan, extra mature cheddar cheese or other strong tangy cheese will work.
• Salt and Pepper to taste.

Equipment:

• A large saucepan
• A large frying pan
• A kettle
• A whisk or fork
• A cheese grater
• A colander to drain the pasta
• A garlic crusher (optional)

Method for Tagliatelle Carbonara Recipe

Boil water in the kettle and add that to the large sauce pan, add a little salt and over a medium heat bring the pan of water back to the boil

When the water is boiling add the pasta (judging how much you will need depending on how many you are serving!) turn the heat down slightly, and cook according to the instructions on the packet

In the large frying pan add a little oil and or butter if using and melt the butter over a lowish heat until it has fully melted.

Add in the bacon lardons or pancetta or bacon bits, and the grated or crushed garlic and cook until the bacon goes crispy and golden, taking care not to burn the garlic. If the garlic looks like it is starting to burn, turn down the heat in the pan. 

Once that looks crispy, turn off the heat and set aside.

In a separate bowl crack open the eggs and gently beat with a fork. Add in the grated parmesan or mature cheddar until you get a paste. Season well with salt and pepper

Once the pasta is cooked, turn off the heat and drain the pasta in a colander, carefully catching some of the pasta water in the bottom of the pan (I tend to take the pan and the colander to the sink and quickly tip the pasta into the colander whilst holding it over the pan in the hope that it keeps some pasta water in the bottom of the pan for me!)

Add the pasta to the big frying pan and stir until the garlic and bacon mix is combined with the pasta, and that some of the heat from the pasta is able to escape. You need the pasta to be still warm but not hot when you add the eggs.

Once you’ve got the heat out of the pasta mix, quickly stir in the egg and cheese mix and a ladleful of the pasta water and stir well until all the egg mixture is evenly distributed throughout the pasta.

Taste to see if it needs more seasoning or more cheese, and adjust if it does.

Serve in bowls with a green salad, and lashings of garlic bread

For my garlic bread recipe see https://www.mamacoopskitchen.co.uk/garlic-bread-recipe/

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