linguine con la 'nduja

‘Nduja has seen a massive leap in popularity in the UK over the last 10-15 years. You used to have to ask for some ‘behind the counter’ at select delicatessens; today you can often find it in many supermarket chains. ‘Nduja is a ‘spreadable’ pork sausage from Calabria and the signature dish of the Spilinga area. Its key ingredients are pork and chillies and it’s normally got a smoked-paprika like taste to it too, though you can find unsmoked varieties as well. The best I’ve found so far in the UK with a reliable local supply is the ‘Delizie Vaticane di Tropea’ brand, and their ‘Nduja di Spilinga’. I put it on pasta, pizza, and sometimes just fresh crusty bread.

Now, a word of caution. And it’s not to do with the heat, though of course ‘nduja does come along with some spicy baggage. Rather, it’s how you decide to use it. A really typical way to use ‘nduja on pasta is like I have in this recipe - basically to mix it into a simpe tomato sauce, because that means that you get enough of a condiment for your pasta without ridiculous levels of heat, or fat (some ‘nduja are quite greasy when they start to melt).

However, I find that diluting the ‘nduja with tomato, or adding it to a tomato sauce, depending on how you want to look at it, robs the ‘nduja of a lot of its signature flavour. It’s really easy to find that you’re simply adding heat to a tomato sauce, with none of the delicious smokey porky flavours from the ‘nduja. As far as I’m concerned, that’s a waste of good ‘nduja and you might as well add hot smoked paprika instead. It will all really depend on the balance of ‘nduja and tomato that you settle on when you cook your version. If you’re not that into spicy stuff this recipe’s possibly worth a try, but if you really like ‘nduja and heat I’d suggest maybe trying the variation I did in the Pesto chapter, with mushrooms.