The exceptional, wherever you are
Caviar, champagne and fine food
Whole grey mullet roe pouches, dry salted, pressed, then air dried for several weeks. A thin coat of beeswax seals the pouch at the end of the drying: it stops oxidation and holds the moisture level reached. Two ingredients in all, roe and salt.
The taste is direct. Saline, iodised, with a bitterness that settles at the back of the palate and a texture that stays supple under the blade when the drying has been led slowly. The Sardinians say bottarga, the Provençals poutargue, the Greeks avgotaracho. The gesture has not moved since ancient Egypt: salt it, press it, dry it in the wind. At the table. Grated over linguine with olive oil and garlic, off the heat. In thin slices on toasted bread with salted butter. Shaved over a scallop carpaccio. It salts the dish, there is no need to add more. With caviar. The two complete each other on the same table: the bottarga brings the saline edge and the bitterness, the caviar the fat and the length. Serve them to open the meal, a few minutes apart.
Pakoff
