Say pasta, in this case, stuffed pasta triangles, and the thought runs to the home kitchen, which, over time, has made the most significant contribution to the birth of a great national heritage.
The Italian cuisine we appreciate today has taken shape over the centuries. It depends on shared gastronomical recipes and many different regional and local traditions.
The Italian gastronomical system emerged from the exchange among territories and between high cuisine, the table of the lords, and low, that of the peasants and poorer social strata.
The history of Italian cuisine begins under the influence of first the Greeks and then the Arabs. But it was the Romans who imprinted that conviviality aspect that is one of its characteristics.
Europe also plays a crucial role in this process. Different European countries influence each other, creating a context of European cultural and gastronomic history that will have so much influence in the New World.
At first, the exchange takes place through wars of conquest and trade. Later it rests on the migratory phenomena that bring the cuisine of Italian mothers and grandmothers into the world.
Emigrants from Italy have been great ambassadors of their country’s gastronomic culture, imparting the impetus needed to transform Italian cuisine into a founding element of national identity.
The nomination of Italian cuisine as Unesco Intangible Cultural Heritage
It is an art that, over the centuries, has woven the country’s history. It is a mirror of its geography and biodiversity and tells the styles and habits of different social classes.
For these reasons, it is a physical and cultural heritage of knowledge and tastes and, last but not least, of beauty.
Thirty years after the Unification of Italy, in 1891, Pellegrino Artusi published The Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well. It is the first collection that includes recipes from every region. In the introduction, the Italian gastronome reflects by asking himself:
“Why, who enjoys seeing a beautiful painting is reputed superior to those who enjoy eating excellent food?”
Artusi captures the material and intangible aspects of food.
It is clear why Unesco has accepted the candidature to recognize Italian cuisine as an Intangible Heritage of Humanity. An asset to be promoted and protected.
Telling the Italian cuisine
This heritage needs skilled people who can tell its story in the best way, in Italy and abroad.
For this reason, food writing should become a teaching subject in universities. There is some delay in recognizing its value as a discipline aimed at training journalists, communicators, and historians.
Regardless of Unesco recognition, the women and immigrants who, over the centuries, have helped shape this precious legacy deserve to be finally told and, if possible, heard by journalists and historians capable of grasping the sense of place and time, reading the socio-cultural aspects and building a welcoming historical framework toward these forgotten stories. Oral history would have new untold pages.
Italian cuisine, home cooking and the smell of pasta dough
Italian cuisine means, above all, home cooking.
If you had entered an osteria in the Middle Ages, you would have found a glass of wine, but you had to bring your food from home.
In our sentimental geography, scents are a compass that orients memory. The sense of smell ajar the kitchen door and, between pots and stoves, a sequence of lasting memories takes shape. In addition to having an emotional value for each of us, they are also valuable in narrating the events of a community and, ultimately, of Italy.
The pasta sheet that the women of my family used to roll out on the cutting board with a rolling pin has a scent that I cannot forget. And a story I never tire of telling.
Back then, children did not watch TV and cell phones for hours. They would play or silently conquer a corner of the kitchen, the magnet room of the house, the warmest and most welcoming one where incessant toil produced smells heralding masterpieces of domestic gastronomy.
In the 1970s, between a soffritto and a pasta sheet, I built memories and collected anecdotes.
Do you also agree that it is time to give voice and historical value to the stories still confined within the walls of kitchens? Before it is too late, those testimonies should flow into a mighty oral history project.
Stuffed pasta triangles
At some point in my life, I felt the urgency to recover a part of my heritage. So I took a course to reacquaint myself with the gestures of the azdore.
Since then, I have become reacquainted with habits that are part of my family, regional and national culture.
Flour, eggs, cutting board, and rolling pin: this is the recipe for Emilia-Romagna pasta dough. Mine is not a perfect sfoglia. I like to think of myself as an occasional pasta maker. Once a week, usually on Sunday afternoon, I make fresh pasta. In addition to the yellow pasta sheet, I mixed eggs and flour with nettles, spinach, peas, red turnip, and parsley.
I made tagliatelle with chestnut flour, buckwheat tagliolini, strozzapreti, tortellini, cappelletti, balanzoni, yellow and green lasagna, garganelli, strichetti, tortelli, maltagliati, triangoli.
Stuffed pasta triangles are the latest among my experiments. I made pasta dough with parsley and the filling with minced boiled chicken and vegetables.
You can season them with butter and sage, but I dared and opted for soy sauce and maple syrup instead. If you trust me and try, the combination will surprise you. Pleasantly, I hope.
Buona cucina, Monica
I wrote about cooking and identity in the post dedicated to bean broth.
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Stuffed pasta triangles and parsley pasta dough
serves 4
List of the Ingredients
Pasta dough
3 eggs
300 g 00 flour
2 tbsp chopped parsley, about 20 g
Filling
hen leg and upper leg, 1
carrot, 1
onion, 1
bay leaf, 2-3 leaves
water, 1 large liter
coarse salt
cow ricotta cheese, about 120 g
grated parmesan cheese, 30 g
To season
salt-free soy sauce, 6 generous tablespoons
maple syrup, 2 generous tablespoons
butter and olive oil to taste
pasta cooking water, 1 to 2 small scoops
Method
Filling
Prepare the stock pot: arrange the hen with whole but peeled onion, a carrot, and bay leaves. Cover with cold water, and add a pinch of coarse.
Put the pan on a small stove, bring it to a boil, lower the heat, and almost completely cover the pan with a lid, then cook for about an hour.
Remove hen and vegetables from broth (strain and set aside for other preparations).
Remove the skin from the hen and mince the meat with a knife after removing the bones. Also, chop half a carrot and 1/3 of the onion, using the ones from the hen’s pot.
Combine veggies with meat and finely chop them together.
Transfer to a bowl, add Parmesan and ricotta cheese, mix, and put the stuffing to rest in the refrigerator.
Pasta dough
Pour the flour onto the cutting board and form a crater in the center where you will put parsley and eggs. Start mixing with a fork and then with your hands.
Let the dough rest covered, out of the refrigerator, for about 30 minutes.
Roll out the pasta dough with a rolling pin or a pasta machine, and cut out squares about 4 cm on a side.
Stuff and close into a triangle.
Seasoning
In a large skillet, melt 100 g butter with a couple of tablespoons of oil, and add soy sauce and maple syrup while stirring.
Cook triangles in boiling salted water. Transfer the stuffed triangles with a slotted spoon to the pan and season gently. Add a little pasta cooking water to make the sauce creamier.