1.313
14 (Fri) November 2010
Spaghetti Nero di Seppia alle Vongole
0.5
by me
at home
-Oksu, Seongdong, Seoul, Korea-
solo
Spaghetti nero di seppia is a type of pasta, made black (nero) by the infusion of squid ink (seppia).
The pasta was already in the boiling water, when I set about to make a quick vongole sauce, only to discover that I was out of white wine and butter.
For the sake of experimentation (har har), I tried substituting rice wine. The two types of wine taste nothing alike, but the substitution worked surprisingly well, though I suspect that it wouldn’t work in the other direction.
However, the “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter” substitution didn’t work. I’d acquired it as a freebie tie-in with some other product purchased at the supermarket – Korean supermarkets often give away products by taping them to other products, either as a marketing promotion or as a way to dump inventory. It was unnaturally sweet, like saccharin, with an unsavory chemical aftertaste, ruining the whole dish.
The clams were also a bit overdue.
