Erica De Mane

Cleaning ricci in Sicily.

Recipe: Spaghetti with Sea Urchins, Hot Chilies, and White Whine

Maybe you’ve noticed, or maybe not, but it’s sea urchin season again, at least at Citarella (actually has been for more than a month now). They’ve got piles of these beautiful spiky things, trucked down all the way from Maine to Manhattan. I find it quite exciting.

I first tasted ricci, sea urchins, years ago on Mondello beach, a middle-class seaside resort just outside of Palermo, Sicily (where people pronounce the word reetzee). Mondello is full of simple waterside restaurants that serve almost nothing but ricci, mostly raw, where locals  and the occasional tourist get down  into huge platters of the round, spiky creatures, picking out the orange roe with little forks and letting them slither down their throats, often followed with a glass of limoncello. Ricci means hedgehog in Italian, hence hedgehogs of the sea, with their spiny shells.

At most of these places you can also order ricci lightly cooked and tossed with pasta. I love them that way. Just a quick sauté with a few standard Sicilian ingredients produces a miraculous dish. The freshly plucked ricci roe is usually flash-seared in a skillet with olive oil, garlic, white wine, a touch of tomato (or not), and hot chili flakes, and then tossed with very al dente spaghetti. The sweet but slightly bitter taste of the sea urchin, raw or cooked, seems perfect to my taste buds.

The whole fresh ricci I buy from Citarella’s fish counter, covered with two-inch-long dark-green spines, are fished wild in Maine, but sea urchins live in every ocean around the world. California is another big harvester; I’ve seen sea urchins from there with dark red spines. In Palermo the spines were a glistening black, but elsewhere they can be ivory-colored or even a gorgeous lavender, sometimes as long as a porcupine’s quills.

I’ve sampled ricci with pasta several times in Manhattan. The best version so far was served to me at Esca. The ricci was made into a raw, puréed sauce, creamy and rich, that enveloped the bucatini beautifully. For a little crunch and contrast, the dish was topped with a scattering of slivered scallions. Very nice. That was a few years back, so I can’t say if this exact dish is still on the menu, but I’m sure the chef is doing something with sea urchins right now. But forget  about restaurant cooking for a moment. Let’s take a walk on the wild side.

When you bring whole ricci into your kitchen (and I know you will), you’ll need to extract the lovely orange roe by cutting a slice off the urchin’s underside with a sharp knife or kitchen shears (which seem to work better for me), holding the thing with a thick rag or something so you don’t stab yourself.  Once the roe is exposed, you gently lift the pieces out with a small fork. It’s not the hardest thing to do. Pour yourself a glass of wine to get in the mood, and then just have at it.  You’ll realize it’s worth it when you taste this pasta, plus these are absolutely fascinating things to look at, so there’s another bonus in bringing them home.

Spaghetti with Sea Urchins, Hot Chilies, and White Wine

(Serves 2)

Salt
1/3 pound spaghetti
Extra-virgin olive oil
2 garlic cloves, very thinly sliced
About ½ a fresh red peperoncino, minced, with seeds
The tongues (that’s what the pieces of roe are called)  from 8 sea urchins (see above for how to extract them)
A splash of dry white wine
6 canned plum tomatoes, lightly drained and very well chopped
A few sprigs of marjoram, the leaves lightly chopped
A handful of flat leaf parsley leaves, very lightly chopped

Put up a pot of pasta cooking water, and bring it to a boil. Add a generous amount of salt, and then drop in the spaghetti.

In a large skillet, heat about ¼ cup of olive oil over medium high heat. Add the garlic, the peperoncino, and the sea urchin pieces. Sauté for not more than a minute. Season with a little salt, and then add the white wine, letting it bubble for a few seconds. Now add the tomatoes, and sauté for about a minute.

When the spaghetti is al dente, drain it, and add it to the skillet, saving about ½ cup of the pasta cooking water. Sauté quickly, tossing everything around until well mixed. Add a little of the cooking water if it seems dry, and then add a generous drizzle of fresh olive oil and the marjoram and parsley. Correct the seasoning with a little more salt, if needed, and give it another gentle toss. Divide it up into two pasta bowls, and eat it right away.