Who doesn’t love a carbonara – the combination of pasta with egg, cheese, pork and a hefty amount of black pepper is just dreamy. All the textures and flavors meld together to make one of the most delectable dishes to ever come out of Rome. Technically it has to be a perfect balance of ingredients, a little too much of one throws the entire dish out of balance. After getting more involved in Japanese cuisine, and experiencing their love of Italian food it dawned on Chef that there had to be a way to meld ingredients that were purely Japanese with a classic Italian dish, and Sea Urchin Carbonara was born.
Innately uni (sea urchin) has the same texture as a custard. When a dollop of uni is put on a plate of freshly boiled pasta it melts, oozes one might say. However, what one wants from the uni in this dish is for it to retain its flavor so it adds a slight funkiness that one would normally get from the Pecorino Romano in the classic…