Le Tagliatelle
Tagliatelle is a type of egg pasta typical of Italy north and center regions, where the tradition in making the dough, locally named “sfoglia” by using common wheat flour and eggs, is an important cornerstone of the Italian gastronomic tradition and especially of the city of Bologna located in Emilia-Romagna region. It seems infact, that this Italian delicacy has its origins in this city and still today is served with the famous Bolognese sauce “ragù” as well as with other types of sauces like mushroom, truffle, gamy, etc.
It is not possible to define precisely the origin of this type of egg pasta, but it is known that Cicerone and Orazio mentioned this dish more than 100 years before Christ. Others locate its origin in occasion of the marriage ceremony between Lucrezia Borgia and Alfonso I d’Este, Duque of Ferrara, on 1487, when the chef in charge of the food, created this pasta to celebrate the beauty of the bride’s long blonde hair.
It is certain that Bolognese tagliatelle dated back to April 16th 1972, when the “Confraternita del Tortellino” together with the Italian Cooking Academy registered the original recipe at the Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Craftsmanship and Agriculture of Bologna by fixing the original Bolognese tagliatelle dimension at approximately 8mm width (after being cooked).
The Bolognese tagliatelle are usually prepared by the “sfogline emiliane”, women dough makers from Emilia Romagna region, (in local dialect “rezdore” that means the queen of the house), who with their experience and virtuosity make a dough using wheat flour and eggs and then roll it by means of a wooden rolling pin specifically made to produce the rolled dough sheet. The name tagliatelle derives from the act of “cutting” or “slicing” the dough sheet. The traditional Bolognese tagliatelle are obtained by rolling the dough into a thin and rough sheet and then by cutting it into stripes with variable width (usually 1 cm approximately) after having rolled it up. Another type of traditional Bolognese tagliatelle is the green tagliatelle, which adds to the classic recipe, chard leafs or spinaches that confer to the dough a particular and tasty green color.
The traditional Emilia Romagna recipe requires that the tagliatelle should be served along with Bolognese sauce, which can be prepared in different but always tasty variations. Among them the “Ragù di cortile”, an old and unique recipe of Bolognese sauce, proposed by the chef Franco Cimini of the Antica Osteria del Mirasole restaurant, located in San Giovanni in Persiceto the true heart of Emilia Romagna region.
