What's for dinner: Spaghetti Carbonara

With all the bacon in the house right now (see posts below), it is understandable that we made bacon and eggs for breakfast yesterday. We had about a piece and 3/4 left over, which Ken crumbled into a bowl and saved in the fridge. (Note: I later found out that he was saving it to, ahem, feed to the dog. Are you kidding me? I spend days making bacon and you're planning on feeding it to the dog? He's just like Rachel's mom who used to grate fresh parmesan on the family dog's food when he got older. Only Kinley is 1. And Ken is a sucker.)

Once his guilt set in that there is no way in fiery hell that I was allowing him to feed my vittles to the dog, I got to decide what I wanted to make for dinner. I had 1/8 of a cup of crumbled bacon. And then I remember Ruth Reichl's version of Spaghetti Carbonara.

RUTH REICHL’S SPAGHETTI CARBONARA
1 pound spaghetti
¼ to ½ pound thickly sliced good-quality bacon
2 cloves garlic, peeled
2 large eggs
Freshly ground black pepper
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese, plus extra for the table

Boil a pot of salted water. Throw in the spaghetti. Cut the bacon cross-wise into pieces. Cook in a skillet for two minutes, until the fat begins to render. Add whole cloves of garlic and cook another five minutes, until the edges of the bacon just begin to get crisp. Do not overcook, or it won’t meld with the pasta. Meanwhile, break the eggs into the bowl youwill serve the pasta in, beat them with a fork. Add pepper. Remove the garlic from the bacon pan. If it looks like too much fat to you, discard some, but you’re going to toss the bacon with most of its fat into the pasta. When the pasta is done, drain it and immediately throw it into the beaten eggs. Mix thoroughly. The heat of the spaghetti will cook the eggs and turn them into a sauce. Add the bacon and its fat, add cheese and serve.

So that's the recipe, but I'm lazy and neither of us wanted to eat a lot of fat. So here's my altered version:

Fill pot with salted water and bring to a boil. Meanwhile, throw 6 unpeeled garlic cloves in the toaster oven at 350 and start chopping an onion. Melt a little bit of fat in a pan (used leftover bacon grease but butter or oil would also work). Add the chopped onion and saute until soft. Add pasta to the boiling water and pull out garlic cloves, which have steamed a bit. The skins will easily slide off. Mince finely and add to the onions, cook on low. Beat two eggs in a bowl. Drain cooked pasta and return to pot (with heat off). Dump the eggs over and mix well. Add the onion/garlic mixture, remaining bacon and as much/little parmesan cheese as you want. I used about 1/4-1/2 cup. Add pepper and serve hot.

Wow. It turned out amazing. The eggs make such a creamy and rich sauce without any added cream and not a lot of fat. The above recipe made dinner and lunch for both of us. Not bad for a 79 cent pack of spaghetti and two eggs. The 1/8 cup of bacon was enough for flavor but not overpowering. Plus, it made me realize that this recipe is easily adapatable to whatever you have on hand. Mushrooms. Artichoke hearts. Smoked salmon. Not that I have those things on hand very often, but I sure like eating them. What is more likely is turkey carbonara... especially given the SEVEN 2-cup-bags of pulled turkey that are currently in the freezer.