Main · Year-round
Squid-ink tagliatelle with calamari, 'nduja and lemon
Jet-black, fire-red, fierce yellow. Spicy, fat, fresh, crunchy on one fork.
I had this dish first in Bologna in 2015, during a week I was supposed to be photographing a wedding and ended up eating my way through the city instead. A guy named Tonino ran a food cart in the Mercato delle Erbe with a pasta machine on a table behind him and a stack of 'nduja jars at his feet. He'd never written down a recipe in his life.
He explained the squid trick to me as a favour, since I'd been there three lunches in a row. Squid is 90 seconds or 90 minutes. Anything in between is rubber. You can either flash-cook it screaming hot, or you can stew it patient and slow until it goes soft again. The middle is a trap. Every time someone gets it wrong, it's because they cooked it for four minutes and got nervous.
The pasta is black because of the ink. The 'nduja is red because of the Calabrian chillies. The lemon zest is yellow because lemons are yellow. Three colours that scream at each other on the plate, and somehow taste like they were always meant to share the bowl. The bread crumbs on top are not optional. They are the whole crunch the dish is built around.
- Total time
- 1 h 5 min
- Serves
- 2 people
- Difficulty
- 4 / 5
- Pair with
- Vermentino di Sardegna or a Greco di Tufo.
Ingredients
Pasta
- 200 g00 flour
- 2medium eggs
- 8 gsquid ink (sachet)
Sauce
- 200 gcleaned calamari, in rings
- 60 g'nduja
- 30 gbutter
- 2 clovesgarlic, thinly sliced
- 1lemon (zest of one, juice of half)
Topping
- 40 gcoarse breadcrumbs + 1 tsp olive oil + parsley
Method
- 1
Pasta: flour, eggs, ink and a pinch of salt in a stand mixer or processor. 1 minute on the dough setting. Wrap, rest 30 minutes. Roll out to setting 6, cut tagliatelle, dust with flour.
- 2
Toast the breadcrumbs in a dry pan with olive oil until deep gold. Set aside.
- 3
Pasta into boiling salted water. 2-3 minutes, al dente.
- 4
Big pan: olive oil, garlic soft. 'Nduja in, melt until the oil runs red. Calamari in. 90 seconds on high heat, no longer.
- 5
Butter in, lemon zest and juice. A spoon of pasta water to bind.
- 6
Pasta in with tongs, lift through the sauce. If it's tight, more pasta water. Twist into deep bowls.
- 7
Breadcrumbs over, parsley, extra lemon zest. Eat immediately.
