So, I'm eating dinner right now. It's something a bit different, I thought I'd try something new.
I've noticed this one product in the grocery stores multiple times, and while I've always had a certain morbid curiosity about it, I never before opted to actually give it a go... However, a while back (before I'd left for my trip to Poland), I was apparently either particularly adventurous or drunk or some combination of the two, and I picked it up to try it out at some point. Since it's currently Sunday and I don't *really* have any dinner makings left over since I made sure to empty my fridge before leaving the country, I'm now eating said mysterious food article.
It's the contents of a rather flashy can that can be found in any Norwegian grocery store, with its colorful and slightly old-timey graphics and its larger-than-standard size... A can of what boastfully markets itself as "Spaghetti a la Capri".
Now, I know what you're thinking... You're probably thinking [*vomiting noises*], and I can understand that, but I've had the occasional canned meal that wasn't entirely awful after spicing it up a bit. So, after opening the can and taking my first tentative taste of the insides, I immediately reached for the secret ingredient in making a mediocre dish turn into something actually edible: Pepper.
I have a glass spice jar of cayenne powder that I use religiously in a number of dishes, and its time had obviously come once again to drown out the somewhat-too-strong notes of misery and existential depression that were the factory settings for the sauce interred within the tin sarcophagus... However, there was a problem. Some moisture had gotten into the cayenne jar. I did not realize this until after I'd started attempting to shake it out into the pot.
Shake 1: Nothing.
Shake 2: Nothing.
Shake 3: Nothing.
Shake 4: Nothing left.
I gazed upon my works; and saw that it was goofed. The mountainous peaks of Capri had weathered an unseasonal red blizzard, and were now covered in a blanket of tranquil chili powder. Silence fell upon the spaghettiscape.
"Aw well, fuck it" I said, and started mixing everything together.
The flavor is now mostly just cayenne, but that's honestly fine... It's a marked improvement upon the original recipe; which had attempted nuance and succeeded only at nnnghuh. But the reason I am currently struggling, and preferring to procrastinate by writing about the whole experience instead of actually eating, is in fact the texture.
Now, don't get me wrong... I'm already something of a blasphemer in that I like my pasta a little bit al gommo. I know, I know... My preferences are incorrect and I will burn for them in the afterlife. I've come to terms with this fact.
But this can contained pasta that had already been cooked to completion, and then stuffed into a can of wet tomato sauce for... I'm not sure I want to know how long. As such, the spaghetti has attained a consistency not entirely dissimilar to Granny's Homestyle Vaginal Secretions™.
The cayenne has done all it cayann. At this point, my only allies going forward are alcohol and tortilla chips. Viva la lotta gloriosa!