Spaghetti alla bottarga della zia Milla (Aunt Milla’s spaghetti with bottarga) by Viola Buitoni

"A love of and aptitude for good cooking were one of the threads my mother and Milla shared. From her, I learned that … bottarga delivers such flavor, you need to do very little to it."

Photo: Molly DeCoudreaux

This is the recipe for Spaghetti alla bottarga della zia Milla (Aunt Milla’s spaghetti with bottarga) from Viola Buitoni’s cookbook, Italy by Ingredient.

You can hear Viola reading an excerpt on bottarga (and this recipe) here:

In Their Words: Viola Buitoni on the Timeless Taste of Bottarga

Viola writes in Italy by Ingredient¹:

At fifteen, my larger-than-life mother crossed paths with a red-haired, gold-eyed beauty. Her name was Milla—short for Camilla—and she summered in the same town where my family has owned a place since the 1950s. It was an instant friendship that lasted a lifetime, and to this day carries between my sisters and me and zia Milla’s daughters. A love of and aptitude for good cooking were one of the threads my mother and Milla shared. Memories of her casual kitchen instincts still inform my cooking. From her, I learned that octopuses are tastier if you leave their small brains in, and that bottarga delivers such flavor, you need to do very little to it.

The caftan-clad zia Milla would swish into the kitchen, and in the fragments of time she’d steal from espresso sipping and Marlboro puffing, she’d string together the magic that would mesmerize me later that day at the table. This recipe is the story of how she could make both bottarga and a summer evening sparkle.