Recipe: Easy First-Time Carbonara

So, as the title suggests, this is my first time to cook spaghetti carbonara. Like, ever. I have several recipes saved in my Pocket app, most of them employing the use of bacon. But since there’s none to be found in the house at the moment (and I can hardly use tocino as a substitute) just as I had an intense craving for carbonara (sorely tempted by a Facebook photo I saw), I just made do with good old Vienna sausage. 😀 Oh and I didn’t really follow any of those saved recipes, I used the recipe at the back of the pasta sauce’s pack. And tweaked it as I deemed fit and substituted what’s in the kitchen. The resulting pasta dish was not too bad, so I thought I might as well share it here. 😉

What I Used:

• ~175-200 grams of pasta
• 1 Knorr chicken broth cube
• 1 tbsp. margarine
• 1 250-gram pack Del Monte carbonara sauce
• 1 small can Libby’s Vienna sausage in chicken broth
• 2 tbsp. grated cheese
• salt and pepper

What I did:

1. Cook the pasta as per usual in water and a little bit of oil. But instead of adding salt, use half the broth cube instead, crushed and mixed well with the water. Set aside half a cup of this for the sauce.
2. Drain and rinse the pasta once cooked. Set aside.
3. Combine the margarine, pasta broth, carbonara sauce, the remaining broth cube, salt and pepper in the sauce pan. Cook in low to medium heat. Stir continuously for 8 minutes.
4. Add the sausage. Let simmer for a couple of minutes, stirring occasionally.
5. Add the pasta and mix until evenly covered with sauce.
6. Add the cheese and mix until evenly distributed. Cover and leave for a couple more minutes in low heat to melt the cheese.
7. Serve and enjoy! 🙂 You may add more cheese toppings for extra oomph.