@177milkstreet · Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street
Saved 2026-05-15 · Posted 2024-06-04 · Status: New
“The hardest recipe of my LIFE” is an accurate description of cacio e pepe: three ingredients (pasta, pepper, cheese) need to merge in a perfect, silky tangle of spaghetti coated in a light melted cheese sauce that doesn’t turn to snot. The three elements, Chris Kimball (@cpkimball) wrote, “need to forge a culinary harmony that, when perfected, makes this one of Italy’s greatest dishes.”
We’ve tried developing this recipe over 30 times and even scrapped our previous version. We’d figured out that it needs to be cooked in a skillet, for maximum starch, which adds creaminess and makes the sauce cling to the noodles. What we’d forgotten to consider was the noodles themselves. For great cacio e pepe, you need spaghetti that leeches out more starch, which essentially means you should look for a pasta that says “bronze drawn” on the package.
This is because noodles have been extruded through bronze, not teflon, material, have a rougher surface, which allows them to release more starch. (This is the reason high quality pastas tend to look a little powdery.) For this reason, it’s worth springing for a more expensive spaghetti, but De Cecco is affordable, works well, and is available in most supermarkets.
Get the recipe for Cacio e Pepe via the link in our profile, under “RECIPES” → @177milkstreet
#milkstreet #milkstreetrecipes #cacioepepe #pastarecipes #easyrecipes #cooking
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Comments (15)
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Gotta go to Rome to figure out how to make the sauce the right thickness
Fresh pasta gives a better starchy water.
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Just like how slow songs are the hardest to play
And the most difficult pronunciation....😂 love ya
Now solve the dry, clumping Carbonara mystery? To cream or NOT to cream?