Spaghetti alla gricia
Spaghetti with bacon and pecorino chese
The Spaghetti alla grigia is the centerpiece and mother of all the four classic roman pasta dishes: If you add egg, you have the Spaghetti alla carbonara. If you remove the bacon, you have the spaghetti cacio e pepe. If you add tomato, you have spaghetti all’Amatriciana, of which alla Grigia is consider its ancestor.
It is said that the alla gricia recipe was invented by shepherds from Lazio who, with the few ingredients available, prepared a dish as simple as it was substantial.
It is also said it originates from Grigiano, which lies not fra from Amatrice, where is sibling all’Amatriciana comes from.
A well made pasta alla gricia must be creamy and tasty with only the help of cheese and cooking water
There is great consensus regarding the few ingredients to use, but I guess it is half of the recipes I’vee seen, where a bit of white wine is used as well.
The right pasta to use for this dish is spaghetti or rigatoni. But other pasta types work well too.
Ingredients
4 persons (starter)
Cooking time: 25 minutes
400 g Spaghetti 400 g
250 g Guanciale(or pancetta or bacon)
60 g pecorino romano to grate
- Pour the diced meat into a hot pan and brown over medium-high heat for about 10 minutes, stirring often to prevent it from burning. If using pork cheek(guanciale) put it into a cold pan, turn on the heat and brown the meat. When it is golden, remove the meat and set it aside, leaving the pork fat in the pan, and turn down the heat.
- In the meantime, put the water for the pasta to boil, and cook the spaghetti al dente, or according to instructions on the package.
- Grate the Pecorino with a fine grater and keep aside. Pour a ladle of the pasta cooking water into the pan with the bacon still hot at the bottom and swirl it to create an emulsion.
- Drain the pasta when almost done and add it to the pan with fat and pasta water emulsion and finish cooking for a minute or two. Sauté and stir often, so that the starch released by the pasta mixes with the fat/water, creating a creamy sauce. Remove the pan from the heat and add the grated Pecorino.
(alternatively, add a bit of the cooking water to the grated pecorino, to make a creamy sauce, and add to the pasta. In this way it is a bit easier to make the cheese integrate with the pasta) - Dilute with a little hot pasta cooking water, mix quickly to obtain a fluid and creamy dressing. Lastly, add the browned meat and stir it all together, or just drizzle the meat pieces over the pasta when on the plate.
- Serve immediately and add a generous amount of freshly grated black pepper on top.
- seasoning, the Pecorino is very salty)
- 1-2 small dried pepperoncini chili pepper
Tips
The right pasta for this dish is spaghetti, but you can use any pasta of your liking.