LASAGNE À LA MERDE

(Lasagne Cacate)

Serves 6

225 g/8 oz lean veal in one piece

225 g/8 oz pork in one piece

50 g/2 oz lard

1 medium onion, minced

2 tablespoons tomato extract or 3 tablespoons tomato purée

225 ml/8 fl oz red wine

450 ml/16 fl oz water

1 bay leaf

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

675 g/1½ lb lasagne ricce

450 g/1 lb fresh ricotta

175 g/6 oz grated salted ricotta or caciocavallo cheese

450 ml/16 fl oz plain tomato sauce

To make the ragù, sauté both pieces of meat in the lard in a heavy casserole until browned on all sides. Remove from the pan and in the same fat sauté the onion over very low heat until it begins to colour. Add the tomato extract and the wine, stirring until the extract dissolves. Add the sauce, the water, and the bay leaf. Return the meat to the pan and simmer for an hour, or until the meat is well cooked and tender. Remove the bay leaf. Dice the meat and return it to the sauce. Correct the salt and add a sprinkling of pepper.

Cook the pasta in abundant boiling salted water. Put the fresh ricotta in a large bowl and soften it by stirring in a ladle of the water in which the pasta is cooking.

Drain the pasta when it is al dente and toss it together with the ricotta. Serve by the plateful, topping each plate with a ladle of the ragù and a liberal sprinkling of grated cheese.

If washed down with abundant wine, lasagne cacate sets you up for twelve months:

Lasagni cacati e vinu a cannata

Bon sangu fannu pri tutta l’annata.

Lasagne à la merde and wine by the pitcher

Make good blood for the whole of the year.

Although not everyone in the nineteenth century could afford pasta at New Year’s, no sacrifice was too great to ensure that pasta was served at one’s wedding breakfast. Here too a certain type of pasta was obligatory: maccarruna di zitu (zitu means fiancée in Sicilian), once more served with a ragù of pork meat cooked in tomato sauce and, in some towns, ’ncaciata–with pieces of cheese incorporated. It is not necessary to get married in order to enjoy pasta ’ncaciata, much to the satisfaction of my children, who love it. I usually make the very simple version I learned from my mother-in-law. It merely requires that I sprinkle little cubes of primosale or caciocavallo over pasta with a pork-and-tomato sauce, then return it to the saucepan and heat it for a few minutes until the cheese begins to melt. A wedding breakfast would call for this fancier version.