What is the difference between pastas?

When it comes to Italian cuisine, divinity is in the details. Because Italian culinary culture is so focused on eating fresh, seasonal produce, dishes often contain many of the same ingredients. And yet – by magic, by skill, or by the perfect amount of both – each dish has its own uniqueness. Take carbonara and Amatriciana, for example.

Both are pasta dishes with sauces containing Pecorino cheese and guanciale, usually served over long noodles. If you haven’t heard of guanciale, it’s a cured piece of meat – much like pancetta – except it comes from the fatty jowl of the pig. Pecorino, on the other hand, is a tangy, earthy cheese made from sheep’s milk.

Pasta carbonara and Amatriciana are part of a class of dishes that many Italians find “perfect” – so traditional that they are beyond reproach. However, after tasting both dishes, you will never confuse one dish with the other. That’s because carbonara — made with eggs, cheese and a light coating of salty pancetta fat — seems almost airy compared to the rich flavors of Amatriciana, which come from the melted guanciale fat mixed with cheese Pecorino and combined with tomato sauce.

Read more: 16 little-known facts about salt

Carbonara gets its creaminess from eggs and cheese

Although a simple pasta carbonara recipe usually only contains a handful of ingredients, it takes some serious technique to truly master this particular pasta dish. It starts with fried guanciale, which will then be joined by half-cooked pasta (spaghetti is classic) and pasta water until the noodles have reached the perfect level of al dente.

Because guanciale can be hard to find outside of Italy, you can try it with pancetta, although it’s not as tender or fatty. Alternatively, you can find butchers selling a similar cut called pork jowl. Trust us, in this case, getting the right fit makes a big difference.

Waiting for, the magically creamy sauce, made only from eggs beaten with Pecorino cheese, is whipped and poured over the hot pasta, cooking the egg with heat transferred from the pasta rather than direct heat from the stove or pan. If the bacon and egg variation seems rather quintessentially American to you, rumor has it that this Roman dish was invented by local chefs who acquired rations for American soldiers during World War II.

Amatriciana contains tomatoes and bucatini

Originating from Amatrice, pasta all’Amatriciana is one of those unique pasta dishes that will make your mouth water. While carbonara tends to be prepared with spaghetti, Romans might consider it blasphemous to prepare pasta all’Amatriciana with anything other than bucatini – a long spaghetti-like noodle with a hollow center for a covering ultimate sauce. The initial step in cooking carbonara and Amatriciana sauce is the same: fry the guanciale. However, after that, Amatriciana calls for San Marzano tomatoes, which are simmered with melted pork cheek fat (and often white wine) for a rich, salty sauce. The addition of tomatoes, which arguably makes Amatriciana the classic Roman pasta dish, was not added until after World War II. Similar to carbonara, Pecorino cheese for Amatriciana is added at the end of the cooking process.

Don’t plan to change anything either, otherwise you may be inadvertently shunned by the population of Amatrice. This is what happened to famous Italian chef Carlo Cracco, who admitted to adding garlic to the recipe on television and received a reprimand from the official Facebook account of the town of Amatrice.

Read the original article on Mashed.