Spaghetti all'Amatriciana, the Amatrice Way (No Onion, No Garlic)
The recipe the town of Amatrice publishes: guanciale browned in an iron pan with a piece of chile and a splash of white wine, peeled tomatoes simmered briefly, and spaghetti tossed first with a heap of grated pecorino, then with the sauce.
Amatrice is a mountain town in the province of Rieti, about 60 miles northeast of Rome, and its town government publishes the recipe on its official website. The comune says the dish began "in bianco," without tomatoes, and that the tomato arrived only at the end of the 1700s; it says it is a mistake to call amatriciana Roman, because shepherds moving their flocks to the Roman countryside carried the recipe to the capital. That white version survives as pasta alla gricia, and Wikipedia notes it was still how amatriciana was made in Amatrice itself in the 1960s.
Wikipedia gives the earliest written recipe under the name as 1914, by Amedeo Pettini, a chef to the Italian royal household, with pork belly, tomato sauce and broth. Today "amatriciana tradizionale" is an EU Traditional Speciality Guaranteed (registered in 2020, according to Italian press reports), and the town defends it hard. When the celebrity chef Carlo Cracco called a clove of garlic his secret ingredient, the comune answered, as Wikipedia and Serious Eats report, that the only ingredients in a true amatriciana are guanciale, pecorino, white wine, San Marzano tomatoes, black pepper and chili. La Repubblica, Katie Parla writes for Serious Eats, called it "the garlic war."
Why it works the kitchen science
Guanciale out, then back in
Lifting it out before the tomatoes go in keeps it soft and sweet instead of turning dry and salty in the simmering sauce, which is the reason the town gives.
Cheese before sauce
Tossing the hot, drained pasta with pecorino first lets the cheese melt onto the strands, so the sauce clings instead of sliding off.
Step by step
- Step 1
If using fresh tomatoes, drop them into boiling water for 30 to 60 seconds, cool them in cold water, slip off the skins, seed them and cut them into strips. If using canned, lift out the tomatoes, seed them and cut them into strips, keeping a little of the juice.
- Step 2
Put a large pot of salted water on to boil over high heat. In a large skillet, preferably iron, warm the oil with the chile over medium-high heat. Add the guanciale and cook, stirring, 4 to 5 minutes, until golden at the edges and the fat is running.
- Step 3
Pour in the wine and let it bubble about 1 minute, until it has nearly evaporated. Lift the guanciale out with a slotted spoon, let it drain, and keep it warm on a plate.
- Step 4
Add the tomatoes to the fat in the pan, season lightly with salt and simmer over medium heat, stirring now and then, about 8 minutes, until slightly thickened.
- Step 5
Meanwhile, cook the spaghetti until well al dente, usually 9 to 11 minutes. Take out the chile, return the guanciale to the sauce and stir once.
- Step 6
Drain the pasta well and tip it into a warm serving bowl. Add the pecorino and toss; wait a few seconds for the cheese to soften.
- Step 7
Pour the sauce over, toss until every strand is red and glossy, and serve with more pecorino at the table.
Spaghetti all'Amatriciana, the Amatrice Way (No Onion, No Garlic)
Serves 4 · 4 plates · 35 min total
Sauce
- 1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 small piece dried chile (peperoncino)
- 4 1/2 oz (125 g) guanciale, cut into short strips
- 2 tbsp dry white wine (the town says "a splash")
- 6 or 7 ripe San Marzano tomatoes, or one 14-oz (400 g) can peeled tomatoes
- Salt
Pasta and cheese
- 1 lb 2 oz (500 g) dried spaghetti
- 1 cup plus 2 tbsp (3 1/2 oz; 100 g) finely grated pecorino (Pecorino di Amatrice or Pecorino Romano), plus more for the table
Method
- If using fresh tomatoes, drop them into boiling water for 30 to 60 seconds, cool them in cold water, slip off the skins, seed them and cut them into strips. If using canned, lift out the tomatoes, seed them and cut them into strips, keeping a little of the juice.
- Put a large pot of salted water on to boil over high heat. In a large skillet, preferably iron, warm the oil with the chile over medium-high heat. Add the guanciale and cook, stirring, 4 to 5 minutes, until golden at the edges and the fat is running.
- Pour in the wine and let it bubble about 1 minute, until it has nearly evaporated. Lift the guanciale out with a slotted spoon, let it drain, and keep it warm on a plate.
- Add the tomatoes to the fat in the pan, season lightly with salt and simmer over medium heat, stirring now and then, about 8 minutes, until slightly thickened.
- Meanwhile, cook the spaghetti until well al dente, usually 9 to 11 minutes. Take out the chile, return the guanciale to the sauce and stir once.
- Drain the pasta well and tip it into a warm serving bowl. Add the pecorino and toss; wait a few seconds for the cheese to soften.
- Pour the sauce over, toss until every strand is red and glossy, and serve with more pecorino at the table.
Adapted from Comune di Amatrice, "Gli spaghetti all'Amatriciana," the official recipe on the town's website (Italian and English text, 4 servings). We follow it as written: 500 g spaghetti, 125 g guanciale (a quarter of the pasta's weight, which the town calls "traditional and sacred"), 1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil, a splash of dry white wine, 6 or 7 San Marzano tomatoes or 400 g peeled tomatoes, a piece of chile, 100 g grated pecorino and salt; an iron pan; guanciale browned over high heat and lifted out; the pasta tossed with the cheese before the sauce. The town gives no times or quantity for the wine. The 2 tbsp of wine, every minute in our steps and the blanching time for fresh tomatoes are ours; the browning time follows Daniel Gritzer's "Bucatini all'Amatriciana," Serious Eats (updated September 23, 2025). Comune di Amatrice. Ingredient list follows the source; the method is in our own words.
All sources (3)
Tips
- No onion and no garlic: the town is explicit, and Gritzer's side-by-side tests found onion and garlic distract from the pork and tomato.
- Spaghetti is the Amatrice pasta; Wikipedia says bucatini is now the most common choice in Rome.
- Pecorino di Amatrice is hard to find in the US; Pecorino Romano is the usual stand-in.
- The town's recipe calls for chile and no black pepper; add a grind at the table if you like, as many Romans do.
The rules people argue about
What the sources agree on, what they don't, and what is just a good story.
- Amatriciana is from Amatrice, not Rome. Disputed: the town says Amatrice and calls the Roman label a mistake; Parla (Serious Eats) writes that its origins "possibly" lie near Amatrice and that it is now part of Rome's canon; food historian Oretta Zanini De Vita, via Parla, says the original had onion.
- Never onion or garlic. Disputed: the town's recipe has neither; Ada Boni's classic Roman cookbook uses onion (Parla; Wikipedia).
- Black pepper belongs in it. Disputed: the comune's statement to Cracco listed black pepper and chili (Wikipedia); its published recipe lists only chile; Gritzer prefers chile flakes with a little black pepper.
- The dish had no tomato until the 1700s. Documented as the town's account; Wikipedia dates the first written pasta-with-tomato recipe to 1790.
- Amatriciana tradizionale is EU protected. Documented by Wikipedia (Traditional Speciality Guaranteed in the EU and the UK).
- Guanciale must be a quarter of the pasta's weight. Documented as the town's rule (125 g to 500 g).
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