Recreating the Arrabbiata from a Nishi-Azabu Café Bar: Ryuji on "Umami" and Why Thick Noodles Work

The core of this episode is the decision to deliberately add stocks, umami seasoning, and sugar to arrabbiata, a simple pasta with no other ingredients, along with Ryuji's explanation of why. Futamatsu joins as a conversation partner, and the recording proceeds with drinks in hand.

What Ryuji ate at the restaurant was penne arrabbiata. The video uses spaghetti because Ryuji figured people don't make penne much at home, but making it with penne is fine too. The two say that with penne, it becomes a "snacking pasta" to go with drinks.

According to Ryuji, the restaurant's pasta clearly had a strong umami flavor. Ryuji's view is that customers who order pasta late at night won't be satisfied unless there's umami in it, and Futamatsu agrees: "You feel like something's missing." One member of the group apparently ordered the pasta three times. Ryuji also says the same restaurant's miso cream pasta was delicious, but its signature dish is probably the arrabbiata.

Ryuji prefaces the ingredient explanation by saying it's "pretty important." The pasta is De Cecco 1.9mm. While saying it's unclear whether the restaurant's penne was thick, Ryuji says thicker pasta tastes better. Ryuji explains that De Cecco is roughly the number two pasta maker in Italy, with Barilla being number one. Because it's made with bronze dies, its surface is rough, so sauce clings to it more easily than to Ma-Ma pasta, which has a smooth surface. However, since the sauce itself is very tasty this time, Ma-Ma 1.9mm or the like will do if De Cecco isn't available.

For the chili, use sliced rings rather than whole takanotsume peppers. Whole ones are spicier. This time Ryuji wants to add a lot of chili but avoid making it too spicy, so sliced chili was chosen deliberately. During the tasting later on, Ryuji also says, "Whole chili peppers would be too spicy, no good," and "If you put that much chili in with the seeds, you'll die."

The umami ingredients are kombu dashi, chicken bouillon (torigara soup), and Hi-Me. Hi-Me alone would be fine, but Ryuji wanted a complex umami, so the three were combined. Garlic is 20g (about 4 cloves) for two servings. Garlic is the only thing chopped; Ryuji says it's better not to put anything extra into arrabbiata, so no onion is needed either.

Right after calling onion "unorthodox," Ryuji admits that the recipe itself is unorthodox the moment kombu dashi and chicken bouillon go in, and says the restaurant's arrabbiata was also "extremely unorthodox." Futamatsu says arrabbiata always felt like something was missing, and Ryuji says that few restaurants add umami to arrabbiata, with most relying on salt, tomatoes, and the umami of the tomatoes. Ryuji's own position is that "going all out tastes better."

Ryuji says that while it's possible to make it tasty with just salt and tomatoes, being able to do so doesn't earn you anything; what matters is that it tastes good. Some people think they're impressive for being able to cook with just salt and ingredients, but that's not impressive at all. Cooking is done to make delicious food, those people have confused the means with the end, and you should use whatever you can—that is Ryuji's argument. Futamatsu responds that even people who say they avoid umami seasonings call food "delicious" when eating out, even though it contains umami seasoning. To this, Ryuji adds that there are also plenty of times when food tastes good without it.

The pasta is boiled separately. Add salt to the water at about 1% concentration, roughly like "a slightly strong clear soup." Without salt, the pasta itself won't have any flavor, so it's better to season it as a base.

Use separate olive oils for sautéing and finishing. Sautéing drives off the flavor, so there's no need to use good oil for that. On the other hand, drizzling it at the end makes things dramatically tastier, so that's where to use good Italian olive oil. This oil was bought online; Ryuji doesn't know the brand but tasted it and found it good. For sautéing, use 3 tablespoons for two servings. Ryuji emphasizes that skimping on olive oil makes it taste bad.

Put the chopped garlic into the oil before turning on the heat, then heat it and "brown it just a little." Ryuji says this is extremely important, and while admitting the degree is hard to judge, instructs to sauté until golden brown and fragrant. Answering Futamatsu's question, Ryuji explains that the chili burns easily, so it isn't added at the start but later. Because it's sliced, it doesn't get that spicy even in quantity, and arrabbiata tastes better when it's a little spicy.

After sautéing the garlic, turn off the heat, add one can (400g) of whole tomatoes and crush them well, then turn the heat back on once they're crushed. Diced tomatoes won't make much of a difference.

The first seasoning added is sugar, 1 teaspoon. Ryuji says just adding this makes a world of difference and insists, "Definitely add it." In Ryuji's explanation, this is where onion would normally go, and the purpose of onion is to add sweetness, so sugar substitutes for it. Ryuji also says that almost no Italian recipes call for sugar, that Europeans don't use sugar in cooking, and that using sugar in cooking is an American and Japanese cultural thing.

Next come the stocks. When Futamatsu says, "I've never heard of putting dashi in arrabbiata," Ryuji replies that a large share of restaurants do, and if you want restaurant flavor you should definitely add it. However, Ryuji doesn't think BLISS CLUB uses kombu dashi, speculating that maybe there's kombu-cha (kelp tea powder) in it, as many restaurants add kombu-cha. The amounts are 1 teaspoon each of chicken bouillon and kombu dashi, plus 8 shakes of Hi-Me. The flow is that Ryuji figured those two alone wouldn't be enough, so Hi-Me was added. For one serving, halve the amounts.

The sauce is reduced to cook off the acidity. According to Ryuji, the tomato sauce at the restaurant had no acidity. From this, Ryuji infers that the restaurant must be adding either onion or sugar.

The pasta is 200g for two servings. Boil pasta with a 12-minute package time for 10 minutes and pull it out slightly firm. Add about two ladlefuls of pasta water to the sauce to loosen it, and simmer the pasta over high heat to bring it to just the right firmness. Tomato sauce pastas often use 1.6mm, but Ryuji repeats that thicker is better for this recipe. Futamatsu also remarks that thick noodles make it feel more restaurant-like.

Plate it, and finish with good olive oil and grated cheese. By the time it's plated, photographed, and eaten, it will be in just the right state.

The pairing is white wine. Ryuji explains that red would be fine if the dish were richer, but this pasta is fairly light, so white goes well.

After one bite, Futamatsu says "This is way too good," asks Ryuji for a handshake, and jokes, "Are you a chef?" Futamatsu was also surprised that it could be recreated without particularly difficult steps. Ryuji confirms the match with the restaurant's flavor: "This is the kind of umami, I think this is it." On the sweetness, Ryuji says the restaurant probably uses sugar too, and even if it were onion, the sweetness would be about this level. The two agree that the heat is "definitely there" but not too spicy.

Ryuji says that good olive oil makes it feel about 1.2 times tastier. Futamatsu remarks that since there are no other ingredients, the thicker noodles serve as an accent. During the tasting, Ryuji also says another advantage of thick noodles has come to light: they don't get soggy easily. The al dente state after 10 minutes of boiling and a short simmer is the ideal firmness, and it stays tasty even as time passes. Ryuji's view is that these noodles are good for eating little by little as a snack with drinks.

In fact, Ryuji had already recreated the dish once the day after eating at the restaurant and had the companions taste it. This version has been "powered up" from that one: a bit more chili, and the pasta changed to bronze-die De Cecco, slightly thicker than before. The previous one was delicious too, but Ryuji says this one is about "twice" as good.

The second half turns into casual conversation. Ryuji holds Futamatsu's palate in high regard, saying not a single restaurant Futamatsu has recommended has been a miss. Futamatsu says that upon visiting a good restaurant, the first impulse is to tell Ryuji.

The restaurant Futamatsu brings up is "Kurousagi" in Okinawa. It's a quirky place where everything is additive-free, and people around Futamatsu were apparently saying, "If Ryuji went there, there'd definitely be a fight." Ryuji replied, "There's no way I'd fight—I like additive-free food." According to Futamatsu, the owner went on at length about umami seasonings, explaining that additive-free food loses its flavor once you drink water, whereas umami seasoning lingers on the tongue. It's unclear whether filming permission can be obtained, but they settle on making the next episode a Kurousagi episode.

Futamatsu then asks about restaurants Ryuji has enjoyed recently, but Ryuji declines to name them, saying more customers would be a problem. For the second restaurant as well, Ryuji only answers that it's in the Ebisu area and serves creative Italian.

Finally, the topic turns to a casting call for a dating reality show aimed at former couples and ex-spouses aged 35 to 55. Ryuji says, "That's just for publicity," and mentions receiving many reality show offers. Ryuji once got an offer for a TV show and, on looking at the details, found it involved strangers of opposite sexes coming home from work and sleeping in the same bed, so Ryuji turned it down. Ryuji says that no matter how much someone is their type, love at first sight doesn't happen—you can't fall for someone without knowing what they're like inside. When Ryuji says it takes about ten dates to know, Futamatsu counters that ten is too many, that compatibility is clear after two or three, and that women would find that off-putting. Ryuji still refuses to budge—"No way"—and the video ends.