Dish · italian
Amatriciana
Bucatini in a sauce of guanciale, tomato, and pecorino, with a chili kick from red pepper flakes and no garlic or onion in most versions. The guanciale fat, not olive oil, carries the sauce.
Where it comes from
The dish takes its name from Amatrice, a town in Lazio, where a plain guanciale and pecorino pasta predates tomatoes and picked them up only after tomatoes spread through Italian cooking. Rome later adopted the tomato version as its own.
What cooks argue about
The long-running fight is guanciale against pancetta, since pancetta is easier to find but lacks the same rendered fat. Cooks also split on whether onion or garlic belongs in the pan.
Nobody has published a amatriciana recipe yet. The page stays out of search until one exists, which is the rule for every thin page here.