Bucatini alla zozzona recipe

Zozzo means filthy in Italian, and that's a fairly accurate way to describe this delicious Roman pasta recipe, said Rosie Mackean. It is a hybrid of rich eggy carbonara and tomatoey, meaty amatriciana, with a few sausages thrown in for good measure. With this, it is much easier to get the creamy emulsion in a large quantity than with carbonara, as the acid in the tomato sauce helps to coagulate the egg yolks. Slurpy, fun and absolutely heavenly, this is a great pasta main for a dinner party.

Ingredients:

• 250g guanciale (Italian dry cured pork cheek), trimmed and diced (use pancetta if you can’t find guanciale)
• 6 Italian-style sausages
• 2×400g cans of cherry tomatoes
• 800g dried bucatini pasta
• 9 egg yolks
• 80g pecorino romano cheese, finely grated, plus extra to serve (optional)
• 2 tsp crushed black peppercorns

Method:

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• Put the guanciale in a cold, deep saucepan. Get it over a low heat for a few minutes, then increase the heat to medium. As the pan heats up, the guanciale will gently render off its fat and become golden and crisp – this will take some time, around 15 mins. Crumble in the sausage and fry it in the guanciale fat for 5 mins – it doesn't need to brown too much.
• Stir in the cherry tomatoes and bring up to a simmer, then leave to cook for 30 mins. The cherry tomatoes will burst and release their sweet juice into the sauce, which is great with the salty meat.
• For the pasta, bring a large pan of water to the boil. Salt it a little less generously than you normally would – there's salt in some of the other ingredients. Drop in your bucatini and stir it really well to prevent sticking.
• The pasta will need around 10-12 mins to cook to al dente.
• Meanwhile, mix the egg yolks, pecorino and black pepper together in a separate bowl to form a yellow paste. When the pasta is a couple of minutes away from being al dente, take a small ladle of hot pasta water and whisk it into the egg yolks – this is called tempering the eggs, and it warms them up so that when they go into the hot pasta, they don’t seize.
• When your pasta is al dente, set aside your largest mug full of pasta water, then drain the rest. Put the pasta back in its pan and pour in the tomato sauce, mixing it over low heat. Remove from heat, then pour in the egg mixture and a good splash of the pasta water and stir everything together very well. You will instantly see the sauce become creamy and glossy. Add a little bit more pasta water if it is a bit thick, then serve. Sprinkle over extra pecorino, if you like.

Taken from Good Time Cooking: Show-Stopping Menus for Entertaining by Rosie MacKean, published by Pavilion Books at £26. To buy from The Week Bookshop for £22.99 (incl. p&p) visit theweekbookshop.co.uk.

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