Pasta Carbonara (aka Pasta with Peas)

L here - I've never really succeeded in making this dish, though it is theoretically quite simple.  The origin of the name comes from its first big fans, charcoal makers.  Italian laborers covered in coal dust apparently have a lighter touch than I.

The dish is essentially pasta with eggs, bacon (pancetta if you want to get fancy about it), parmesan, pepper, olive oil, and bit of cream if you're a true fat-loving American.  My recipe was based on Emeril's, with a few changes (mainly in that he probably made his with more flair and "Bams" or that mine simply has not been taken up as many notches).  Anything to which you add bacon can't be that bad, but it's the eggs that defeat me.  Who wants to eat pasta with scrambled eggs?  Which is exactly what happens when I toss my egg-parmesan-cream-nutmeg mixture into the just cooked pasta. 

The peas are another story.  The Albanian owned local Italian place in my home/cowtown didn't always use the most authentic recipes, but they did things to their bread that would make Moses ask for another round if their recipe had been manna.  Out of fondness for their pea-laden Pasta Carbonara, I add peas to mine, and tsp of nutmeg because it tastes good.  Also as further evidence to our friend A that peas do indeed belong in pasta. 

Pasta Carbonara

R was nice enough to say it was tasty and the sauce "light" (always good when cooking for an anti-cream sauce heathen), but I'll have to try again.  Our kitty, D, did adore the peas - or at least she would gum them mercilessly and spit then back onto the plate.  We always wanted a personal pea-smasher. 

Sources tell me that this dish was popularized in Italy after World War II, when some fresh food was scarce and American soldiers could supply locals with heaps of bacon and eggs.  Not ones for a hearty American breakfast, they tossed them with some noodles. This is just a nice way of again proving to me that everything comes back to my third true love, national security.