How do you make your carbonara?

[QueenOfGoths]

Wierd - I have just been googling carbonara as I plan to make some tonight. With homemade pasta too

I have gone for a simple Antony Worrall Thompson recipe from BBC food

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/spaghettiallacarbona_73311.shtml

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

What's an alfredo sauce to you Johnny?

Is it basically a cream and mushroom sauce, occasionally with peas? Seems a popular US term and seems to vary in ingredients a little - it's one of those dishes where it's difficult to work out if there's a 'common'/authentic version.

Peas? Urgh.

To me, it's a basic white sauce with parmesan.

http://www.wish.ca/food/recipe/309/

 

[tarannau]

Cream and butter then. A good artery hardening sauce - for some reason that term doesn't seem to be used that much over here. I'm more familiar with it from ready meals and bad restaurant dishes, hence the mushroom and pea confusion.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

Cream and butter then. A good artery hardening sauce - for some reason that term doesn't seem to be used that much over here. I'm more familiar with it from ready meals and bad restaurant dishes, hence the mushroom and pea confusion.

My 'carbonara' is to die for.

 

[mrsfran]

It's Cheesy. I wouldn't take it to heart. Her friends think she's wonderful, sublime and amazing don't you know, that kind of thing.

You've done some fantastic work on your food blog and I always enjoy reading YI's menu choices and selections. Nice to have both of you around.

Appreciate what YI's saying about techniques and strengths as well. I'm hugely confident in some cuisines and cooking areas, much less so in others. I've never been particularly arsed with desserts or pastry and have very basic abilities there as a result, yet I could butcher and process most animals fairly professionally and quickly. I like and admire the way you're methodically trying out new skills and recipes on your blog - it's always easy to settle into a more restricted range. I'm lucky to have so much unusual produce on my doorstep, which helps keep a lazy arse like me on my toes.

Cheers. I was going to say "I'm sure Tarannau's better than me at a lot of things too".

I believe Cheesy's friends call her cooking "orgasmic" and "divine", btw. I'm glad she's got such supportive friends.

 

[tarannau]

My 'carbonara' is to die for.

TBF Johnny, as much as I like a proper carbonara, I do find it difficult to stop myself sloshing cream into the pan for added richness.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

TBF Johnny, as much as I like a proper carbonara, I do find it difficult to stop myself sloshing cream into the pan for added richness.

Mine's not a 'proper' carbonara, though. It's quite improper.

 

[tendril]

as Urbans resident superior chef,

But you're just an amateur Cheesy, I does it for a living!

 

[tarannau]

Same here. Most of us probably do something more similar to an alfredo than a carbonara if you know what I mean. Carbonara's a much abused term

Cream as a dessert lubricant I'm not too keen on, but I can lap the stuff up when it's part of a cooked sauce.

 

[Y_I_Otter]

You've done some fantastic work on your food blog and I always enjoy reading YI's menu choices and selections. Nice to have both of you around.

And it's nice of you to say so. I enjoy reading Fran's blog as well.

Appreciate what YI's saying about techniques and strengths as well. I'm hugely confident in some cuisines and cooking areas, much less so in others. I've never been particularly arsed with desserts or pastry and have very basic abilities there as a result,

Me and all. I'm more a top-of-the-stove man. Ovens, in my world, are mostly for roasting and warming plates.

yet I could butcher and process most animals fairly professionally and quickly.

That's a skill that was very slow in coming, for me. These days, I'm a dab hand at dealing with fowl, bunnies and the like and, with help, I can do my own goats and deer; but the idea of dispatching and carving up a yearling heifer or a market-weight pig scares me to death. In the 1980s, when I was in Lafayette, Louisiana, I attended a Grand Boucherie de Cochon, a traditional autumn hog-killing, where they kill a pig every hour or so and you get to see how they used to deal with the various parts in the old days. It's an enormous amount of work (and here at home we wouldn't have the beer tent and the live Cajun music to enhance the experience).

I like and admire the way you're methodically trying out new skills and recipes on your blog - it's always easy to settle into a more restricted range.

I've read somplace that the average North American home cook prepares something like ten to twelve meals in rotation. From what I've seen, I'd say that's a generous estimate. I guess it's a live-to-eat versus eat-to-live thing, but I'd hurl myself off a bridge if I were consigned to a culinary repertoir as limited as that.

I'm lucky to have so much unusual produce on my doorstep, which helps keep a lazy arse like me on my toes.

My luck is being so close to the source of what we eat-- knowing, absolutely, the provenance of 90% of our food. The other 10% consists of jars and bottles of stuff from around the world, via ethnic markets in the city, that enable me to turn it into the dishes we love.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

But you're just an amateur Cheesy, I does it for a living!

What if you do it badly?

Would you also say that prostitutes fuck better than non professionals?

 

[miniGMgoit]

Bacon, Mushrooms, Spaggetti.
When its all cooked and hot I mix in some eggs and palmesan cheese.
No cream

 

[mentalchik]

It's referred to as "bacon and egg pasta" by my kids......


it's one of their favs !



that's all !

 

[Cheesypoof]

Cheers. I was going to say "I'm sure Tarannau's better than me at a lot of things too".

I believe Cheesy's friends call her cooking "orgasmic" and "divine", btw. I'm glad she's got such supportive friends.

they do! anyone who tries my food says it. I put a lot of love and effort into cooking though as I suspect you do too.

I didnt mean tht the Otter's food is 'superior' to yours merely that his dishes do read like someone who's a trained chef, i mean he stands out from everybody. There are lots of excellent cooks on Urban.

 

[Cheesypoof]

But you're just an amateur Cheesy, I does it for a living!

i was referring to Y_I_Otter as being Urbans superior chef, not me. I have already clarified that earlier in the thread....look back

 

[Fedayn]

they do! anyone who tries my food says it. I put a lot of love and effort into cooking though as I suspect you do too.

Jesus you're one tedious narcissistic fucking twat aren't you!

 

[Cheesypoof]

Jesus you're one tedious narcissistic fucking twat aren't you!

Harsh ^^^

If you find me tedious put me on ignore twerp. Duh, now bugger off and make yerself useful

 

[Y_I_Otter]

*sigh*

It's not a contest. If you made it, and somebody liked it, that's all that matters. Making people happy and unhungry is what it's about. If they come back, years later, with something like, "damn, that herbed goat cheese frittata you made for breakfast that night we stayed over was fucking incredible!" your job was well done.

 

[butchersapron]

Bollocks to that. It is a contest.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

they do! anyone who tries my food says it. I put a lot of love and effort into cooking though as I suspect you do too.

I didnt mean tht the Otter's food is 'superior' to yours merely that his dishes do read like someone who's a trained chef, i mean he stands out from everybody. There are lots of excellent cooks on Urban.

Otter taught at a cooking school, I believe.

 

[Y_I_Otter]

Otter taught at a cooking school, I believe.

Strictly speaking, no. I taught cooking in the hospitality department of a community college-- six semesters of "small quantity food preparation" to foundation program students.

Or, 'adult day-care', as we called it.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

Strictly speaking, no. I taught cooking in the hospitality department of a community college-- six semesters of "small quantity food preparation" to foundation program students.

Or, 'adult day-care', as we called it.

That's a cooking school. You've told me before I think, but was it the downtown VCC campus?

If so, I've eaten your food.

 

[Y_I_Otter]

That's a cooking school. You've told me before I think, but was it the downtown VCC campus?

If so, I've eaten your food.

Nah, it was in Surrey. A long way to go, for a discount crab vol au vent.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

Nah, it was in Surrey. A long way to go, for a discount crab vol au vent.

Surrey?

Did you have a job at the Wendy's training center?

 

[Y_I_Otter]

Might have paid better...

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

Might have paid better...

...plus all the Baconators you could eat.

 

[Santino]

Bollocks to that. It is a contest.

Butchers sees the truth.