Pasta alla gricia

Gricia is the least famous of Rome's four pasta sauces and the one the other three are built from. Guanciale, pecorino romano, black pepper, pasta water. No tomato, no egg, no garlic, no oil beyond what the pork gives up. Add tomato and you get amatriciana; add egg and you get carbonara; take away the guanciale and you are left with cacio e pepe. Two explanations circulate for the name, one pointing at Grisciano, a hamlet near Amatrice, the other at the gricio, the term used in Rome for the bread and grocery sellers who came down from the Grisons and the Valtellina. Neither is settled, and both are older than the dish's current fame.