Start the pasta water and prep all your ingredients.
Whisk all of the mushroom bacon ingredients--except the mushrooms--together in a medium mixing bowl. Add the mushrooms and toss well to combine.
Add the mushrooms to a dry saute pan, and saute on medium high heat for 8-10 minutes, or until well browned and caramelized. Add as little water as possible if things start to stick.
While the mushrooms are sauteeing, cook the pasta according to package directions and drain. (Reserve some pasta water to thin the sauce after cooking, if desired.)
Place the carbanara sauce ingredients in a blender, and process on high speed until thoroughly blended, about 20-30 seconds. Add a little of the reserved chickpea liquid ('aquafaba') to thin the sauce if needed. Taste and adjust seasoning as desired.
Gently cook the sauce for a few minutes to combine the flavors. Add the cooked pasta and mushroom bacon, and toss to combine. If the sauce gets thick, thin with a little reserved chickpea liquid or pasta water.
Serve with minced parsley and vegan parmesan, if desired.
Notes
I highly recommend using a mellow white miso paste in this recipe (and many others!) if you can find it and you're not allergic to soy. Miso is a safe salt and is great for adding texture and flavor to oil free recipes.
You can make this sauce taste more eggy by adding more kala namak, but this is a salt and therefore high in sodium, so use this ingredient cautiously.
To make it fast: I like to have everything going at once to make this a quick meal--my pasta cooking, my mushrooms sautéing and my sauce in the blender.
You can marinate the mushrooms longer for a more intense flavor if desired. But they taste great with this quick version.
This sauce barely needs to cook--in fact, we're really just heating it through to serve hot.
If the sauce gets thick while you're heating it--or when you're eating leftovers, you can thin it with a little chickpea liquid, reserved pasta water or just tap water.
This sauce will keep in the fridge for about 3-5 days. I haven't tried freezing it yet.