<img class="alignnone size-full wp-image-581" title="carbon" src="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/carbon.jpg" alt="carbon" width="480" height="328" />Spaghetti carbonara. A worldwide favourite, isn’t it? If you believe the sticky gunk that’s sold as carbonara sauce in UK supermarkets it’s made out of something like cheap cream, wallpaper glue and bits of meat that might, if you’re lucky, have some relationship to bacon. And here in Rome? Well there’s no general agreement on what constitutes the exact carbonara sauce, any more than there is over that other pasta staple amatriciana. Except that cornflour and cream really don’t belong.

The other day I decided to try a newish restaurant near the Campo dei Fiori, It sits opposite one of my former favourite, Ditirambo, which has been a bit off of late (Roman restaurants do change, sadly). Grappolo d’Oro Zampolo is a recent addition to a neighbourhood that’s not great for dining frankly. Outside was a sign saying it had been listed as one of the top ten places to eat ‘real’ carbonara in Rome.

I tried something else, the amatriciana, which was fine, and the octopus salad starter was excellent. But the pasta was a bit too al dente for my liking and the sauce rather bland. Plenty of people were eating carbonara, though, and I was glad I didn’t have it. It was beautifully presented but looked much like the dry, pale pasta you can make at home.

So look at the photo at the top of this article. This is the best carbonara I’ve eaten in my entire life, it costs eight euros or so, a bargain, and it can be found in a modest restaurant near the Piazza Navona, La Fiametta, in the Piazza Fiametta (closed Tuesdays).

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This carbonara is oozing with flavour. Bright yellow, peppery, with perfectly-cooked pasta, and intriguing bits of soft delicious meat sprinkled throughout and on the top. What’s the secret? Well I guess you have to ask, which is something of a problem because the service in Fiametta is brusque bordering on rude.

The answer is: lots of good fresh egg yolks, parmesan, pepper and — I spy a secret here — guanciale, not pancetta. Guianciale is a more subtle variety of bacon, made from the cheek. You can read more about it <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guanciale" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://fxcuisine.com/default.asp?Display=8" target="_blank">here</a>. I’ve never had any luck finding it in England and it’s not available everywhere in Italy either. But I see my local Di Per Di supermarket in Governo Vecchio has two whacking great cheeks of it on the counter at the moment so some will be coming home with me.

It should be dead easy to make the perfect carbonara, one that looks like this dish from Fiametta. I somehow suspect I won’t quite get there though. So this is one restaurant that will be on my list in Rome from now on — the pizzas, which are available at lunchtime too, are excellent, though usually without a tomato base, in what’s supposed to be the true Roman style. The waiter was quite friendly with other people too so perhaps one day I might even get a smile out of him. A way to go on that though I suspect.