Standing as we are at the dawn of artificial intelligence, it can be hard to take a saying like “there’s nothing new under the sun” seriously. Yet cliches like that exist for a reason—because they’re true a lot of the time. I ran headfirst into this fact recently, when we asked our followers on social media which food they’d most like to see “Caesared”: pasta, burger, or tacos. The response was overwhelmingly pasta, which I thought would be a fun little culinary challenge.

Standing in the test kitchen, plan of action in my head, I whipped up my vision—spaghetti in a sauce of anchovies melted in olive oil with garlic, black pepper, and a touch of Dijon and Worcestershire, then finished to a creamy emulsion with the starchy pasta water. Topped with parsley- and lemon zest–studded toasted breadcrumbs, I was sure I’d have invented a brand new pasta that successfully evoked a Caesar salad’s elements of romaine, vinaigrette, and croutons. But once I was halfway through cooking, I was suddenly struck by the certainty that there was no way I’d created something new here. While delicious, it was too familiar in technique and flavor. I quickly realized I’d accidentally created an olive oil version of spaghetti burro e alici, hardly an original idea. Whoops!

So while the recipe is, technically, a Caesar salad–inspired pasta, it’s also an olive oil–based burro e alici. I should have realized that the defining ingredients in a Caesar salad are also super common in many pasta recipes.

As long as I was riffing on the classics, I figured I might as well go all-in and do a second version, one that incorporates the egg element of a Caesar by making an anchovy carbonara—basically, replace the guanciale with anchovies, replace the Pecorino Romano with Parmigiano-Reggiano, and add a dab of Dijon and Worcestershire in a nod the the Caesar. The technique is otherwise the same as a carbonara; as you’ll see in the recipe below, I use my double-boiler trick to ensure a perfectly thickened sauce that isn’t scrambled.

Once again, as far as how to classify this pasta, you could say I Caesared a spaghetti recipe, though it’d be just as effective to market it as a “carbonara” for pescatarians. Or, both.

Recipe names aside, the good news is that this little exercise has led to you getting two recipes for the price of one, one eggier and richer, the other brinier and simpler. Make one, make both, just…don’t call it a new idea.