We had planned a cooking date night for a few weeks before we found ourselves at Chelsea Market in New York City, browsing the fresh seafood station. Rows of raw fish, shiny scallops, glistening oysters and lanky squid were on display on beds of ice — but we were looking for the shrimp.

Previous trips the Lobster Place Seafood Market resulted in us giving up on a cooking night and spontaneously indulging in the raw oyster bar with a glass of wine. But not tonight. After selecting 6 of the most beautiful cooked and chilled (and large shrimp), we were off to Giovanni Rana Pastificio & Cucina to purchase the main attraction (also located in Chelsea Market).

Squid Ink pasta has been something I’ve wanted to try for years, but never found myself at a restaurant that served it or was lucky enough for it to come across my plate. So we planned to make it ourselves. We grabbed 2 good sized linguine rolls of the fresh black pasta and headed back to the Rookie Chef Kitchen.

Here’s a look at our take of the recipe from Platings & Pairings. 

 

Ingredients:

12-16oz of fresh squid ink pasta

1/2 cup chardonnay (or your favorite dry white wine)

6 large cooked shrimp (or 12 smaller ones)

10 cherry tomatoes

1 lemon

4 garlic cloves

Fresh basil (chopped for garnish on top)

2 tablespoons tomato paste

4 tablespoons of butter

Salt & pepper

Crushed red pepper flakes

Olive oil

Squid Ink Pasta with Fiery Shrimp

To start, grab a large pot to boil the water — adding a generous amount of salt to cook with it. While the water is boiling, start prepping the rest of the ingredients: chopping the garlic, chopping the basil, taking the tails off the shrimp, cut the cherry tomatoes in halves and zest your lemon (hold onto it for the juice later).

In a large saucepan, add your olive oil and chopped garlic to medium-high heat. Stir for a couple minutes, then add the tomato paste and mix together. Add in your halved cherry tomatoes, chardonnay and 1/4 cup of water together into the saucepan. Dash of red pepper flakes, salt and pepper can be added next — a dash of each (more can be added later).

Once the base of the pasta sauce is thoroughly mixed (about 5 minutes of cooking together once all added) dump in your shrimp and mix so they are coated all around. You’ll want to let them soak up the delicious juices in the sauce for a few minutes.

As the cooked shrimp is warming up in your sauce, your water should be boiling and ready to go. Add your fresh pasta and cook al dente. Fresh pasta only takes a few minutes to cook, so you’ll want to keep an eye on it after 2-3 minutes. There’s a good chance it’ll be done! Ours came out perfect around 4.5 minutes.

Once your pasta is cooked (save a cup of pasta water), add the pasta to the sauce pan and mix all around. Once mixed, you can add your butter and lemon zest and 1/4 cup of  the pasta water. Add more if you’d like to thin out the sauce a bit.

Taste the sauce (once everything is mixed in together) and see if you’d like to add a pinch more salt, pepper or red pepper flakes if you’d like. Plate for your meal and then sprinkle some lemon juice and the chopped basil on top when you’re ready to serve. You did it. You just made fresh squid ink pasta.