Pasta carbonara in Milan, London, and Tarvisio. The famous dish from Latium («and more specifically from Rome», as Wikipedia points out) is slowly moving away from its cradle, receiving appreciations at once unthinkable latitudes. This is thanks to the almost unique mix that the dish can create between a relatively simple execution and a result so intensely delicious it’s heavenly.
The doctrine of pasta carbonara has had Alessandro Pipero and Luciano Monosilio, the minds behind the dining room and the kitchen of Pipero al Rex in Rome, as its most effective clock-up-the-miles evangelists. So it is a good idea to start our mini-focus on pasta carbonara from the version of the past, which Luciano will cook on May 17th-19th, at Eataly, in Ostiense, during the Roma Food and Wine Festival, a three day event dedicated to the interpretations of the past, present and future of some great classics of Italian cuisine. On Sunday 19th, at 7-10 pm, «We will cook it our way», Monosilio explains, «that is to say the same way that charmed Massimo Bottura at Harrods: ‘it’s delicious!’, he told me».
Costardi's carbonara is a risotto in the classic Campbell can (foto Sonia Santagostino)
At the same time, we will also find another pasta carbonara “of the past”, with another double signature from Rome:
Alessandro Roscioli and
Nabil Hassein Hadj of
Roscioli. What’s the difference? «Our carbonara will be Latium-based, rather than Rome-based»,
Roscioli explains, but not from a football point of view, «what makes our carbonara differ from the
Monosilio’s, who’s worked here for 3 years, is the different use of the egg: he whips it up, so it’s much softer. Ours is more traditional, it’s rougher». For sure he doesn’t skimp on the quality of the raw materials: «Parisi’s eggs, the guanciale produced by a breeder who kills 10 pigs which live in the wild, on mount Conero;
Lopez’s organic pecorino aged up to 22-24 months and 70% Sarawak and 30% Sichuan pepper, which has a more citric note than the other. It’s the same we prepare in Campo dei Fiori».
To taste the pasta carbonara of the present, you will need to go back in time, to lunchtime (12 am-3 pm) on the same Sunday. This will be the time of the “Vercelli-style” carbonara, by the Costardi brothers: «A risotto carbonara», Christian announces «which, for the first time, we will put inside some Campbell tins, the same we have used for our rice and tomato». This is the order of the ingredients in the tin cylinder, starting from the bottom: «Beaten egg yolk, guanciale, classic risotto creamed with butter, Grana Padano and stock, some more egg yolk, a very smooth pecorino cream, a few crumbs of guanciale and some pepper». It will be just like tasting a pasta carbonara.
Davide Scabin's carbonara? Squeeze and topdown (foto Cucchiaio d'Argento)
One more step backward, to Saturday 19th (7-10 pm), and we get to the pasta carbonara by
Davide Scabin of
Combal.Zero in Rivoli (Torino). His future is divided between two forms: «I will choose the most suitable concept between lasagne carbonara and the
squeeze version, a condiment suitable not only for pasta but potentially for anything, because the “top-down” sauce is perfect for chicken, hotdogs but also vegetables. A very versatile carbonara.
For info on the programme and to purchase tickets for the Roma Food&Wine Festival click here.
See also
Esposito’s, Vitale’s and Cedroni’s salted codfish
Cerea’s, Scarello’s and Bowerman’s chicken
Ferrari’s, Delcourt’s and Apreda’s couscous
