Day 173

Blood Pasta: Today's post marks a return to the stuff I love the most: offal and any strange variations thereof. I just finished a whole week of Brazilian food, and was eager to restart the blog with something truly different. However, I can't take credit for this discovery - the GF actually noticed it on the restaurant Abattoir's Twitter page yesterday. If you've never eaten there, you're definitely missing out. It's by far one of my favorite places in ATL, and offers something special each time I visit. When she told me that they'd posted an update mentioning blood pasta as a special, I knew I had to have it. I had no idea what blood pasta was, but we promptly booked reservations for tonight to find out.

After arriving, I noticed that the dish was listed on the offal/salted/cured portion of the menu as "blood sausage/blood orange/blood pasta." I love blood sausage and blood orange, but I truly had no idea what the blood pasta would consist of. I asked our super-friendly server about it, and he stated that it was made from only pork blood and flour, nothing else. He also mentioned that it was tossed in raw egg (much like a carbonara), and then served in a blood orange broth with the sausage on top. Yum. I couldn't wait for it to come to the table.

After a few minutes, the dish arrived. I noticed that the blood pasta was cut like spaghetti, but much thicker. After trying a bite of the sausage (rich, salty, bloody goodness, as usual), I dove into the pasta. The texture was a bit firmer than al dente, and it had a smoky, sweet taste that wasn't like any other pasta I've had. Mixed with the light blood orange broth and egg, it was delicious. Believe it or not, the GF actually tried both the sausage and the pasta, which kind of shocked me. I'd never seen her try anything made with blood, so this was a major turning point for her. And, she enjoyed both. I was proud.

Incidentally, I asked the server if anyone else had ordered this dish tonight. Sadly, he said no. I know anything with the word "blood" in the description is probably a hard sell, but it's a shame more people aren't willing to try this sort of thing. Maybe its inclusion on more upscale restaurant menus will make it a bit more palatable over time. In the meantime, more for me, right?

The rest of the meal was also great, In addition to this dish, we also had some awesome cocktails, pickled shrimp, a really tasty chicken dish, and a beef stew featuring tongue, tripe, bacon and egg that was out of this world. Oh, and a killer maple caramel creme w/bacon sugar cookies for dessert.