Pasta with Bottarga

first, a link to it.

then, the way I make it:

first off, these are ingredients for 4 hungry italian boys, so scale them accordingly:

- 5-600 gr of pasta (yes, that's 125-150 gr each: I did say we were hungry)
- a bunch of parsley, flat leaf if possible 'cause it's softer and it cuts better...
- 50-80 gr of butter, if you really have to substitute it with margarine, but believe me it's not healthier :-)
- two cloves of garlic, as fresh as possible if you can.
- one strong chili pepper dry or fresh.
- and yes, some 50 gr of bottarga, freshly grated/ground.

ok, start putting the water on the fire. some 4 liters should be fine, plus a fistful of salt.
in the meanwhile it gets hot, you finely chop the garlic and the chili, melt the butter in a sauce pan (a wok is perfect, if you have one, 'cause you'll need to mix the pasta in it afterwards) and put them in. leave like that for two to three minutes, make sure that the butter is on the verge of boiling but do not burn the garlic. in those three minutes, you finely chop the bunch of parsley, and you add them to the pan. leave one minutes and then shut the fire off.

now, your water should almost done, when it's happily boiling pour in your spaghetti, barilla number 3 if you can find them or any other kind of dry pasta you like. it'll cook itself just stir it from time to time.

don't keep your thumbs idle, though, you grind/grate the bottarga and pour it in the wok, mix it with the rest until it adsorbs the butter and creates a kind of sauce. if it's too dry, add a little bit of butter or olive oil or else some water from the pasta (diet choice).

roughly drain the pasta before it's "al dente", and turn on the fire behind the wok/saucepan. pour the pasta in with a lil bit of cooking water (a few spoonful, or what's left if you drain it quickly), and stir vigorously, until the sauce has spread more or less evenly. then divide it in portion and serve. enjoy! (keep the dishes slightly warm, so that the pasta will stay warmer while you eat it)

variation:

- chives instead of parsley, black pepper instead of chili, and so on. just experiment!!!

luca




other recipe with pictures (that's where I took them from - mine looks much more different, with lots of parsley and ground garlic all over the place

Silly me, you may need to buy it. (never tried it, though)