Carbonara...

[Bronk]

A friend of mine recently introduced me to this pasta dish and I just love it...he got it off Rachael Ray's cooking show...here's the recipe:

http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/food/entertaining/rachael-ray-0806

But I wanted to figure out a way to adapt the recipe for use on the trail...so today I did a bit of an experiment in my kitchen using my fancy feast alcohol stove...and what I came up with was pretty close...at any rate, it was good enough that I would eat it off the trail, and produced a meal that broke the 1000 calorie mark, which is what I consider the minimum for a trail dinner. Here's how to make it on the trail:

Ingredients:

1 package ramen noodles (any flavor, discard the spice pack) 380 cal
4 Tablespoons olive oil 520 cal
4 slices pre-cooked bacon, crumbled into bits 70 cal
1 Tablespoon garlic powder
4 Tablespoons parmasean cheese (could use the packets that Pizza hut and other pizza places give out) 80 cal
red pepper flakes (again, from Pizza Hut) and black pepper to taste

Boil the ramen noodles, discarding the spice pack. Drain the water. Add remaining ingredients and stir until well mixed.

Before anybody starts whining, I'm not suggesting anybody raid Pizza Hut and steal a whole pack full of their stuff...a lot of people have this stuff laying around because they automatically hand it out and you don't use it.

[GGS2]

Hey Bronk, that sounds good. Should have egg to be a true carbonara, but maybe egg noodles will do!

Carbonara means cooked over charcoal, so it is a natural for a trail dish!

[Mountain Wildman]

I knew it had raw egg in it, but didn't know about the charcoal, Cool.
I made it once, the traditional recipe

[moytoy]

I like your recipe. I'm going to try that as soon as I get someplace to get the ingredients. Since I cook on a penny stove 4 nights a week I'm going with what I have tonight. I have most of the ingredients in my pack. EVOO, noodles, black pepper, I've got dried pepperoni slices for the meat and Bear Creek Cheddar Broccoli soup mix for the cheesy part. But like I said I'm going to get the stuff and do it your way.

[Bronk]

Yes, Rachael Ray's recipe calls for egg, I just figured it wouldn't be very likely to carry them on the trail. And most trail towns its probably going to be very difficult to find pancetta (italian bacon) so I substituted something I knew hikers could carry (pre-cooked unrefrigerated bacon).

[moytoy]

I'll also be having a cup of Corbett Canyon Merlot with it.

[Maddog]

sounds good bronk, thanks! :) MADDOG

[sarbar]

I have done a trail version using dry Ova eggs - good. And since the eggs are pasteurized even better! :)

[Mags]

It is called carbonara because the theory (
among MANY others) is that the coal miners would make it with easy to carry supplies (oil, cheese, pancetta, eggs, macaroni, garlic).

Like pasta fagiole (fazool in dialect), there are many variations of this popular dish.

And like the macaroni and beans dish, it is a dish that no one really knows who came up with it! :)


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonara
http://www.cliffordawright.com/caw/food/entries/display.php/topic_id/4/id/117/

And this link (http://ilforno.typepad.com/il_forno/2004/03/of_war_rations_.html) has the best quote of all

"In the end, I hope the origin of the recipe is never found. It's moving to see that a simple dish with only six ingredients can foster so much creativity and give birth to so many legends. If that doesn't make it a classic, I don’t know what does."