54. Gnoccacci Paesani al Sugo di Funghi Porcini di Rocca Santo Stefano

Gnoccacci belong to the culinary tradition of Rocca Santo Stefano. Until after the Second World War, the local population was mainly employed in the primary sector (agriculture and livestock breeding) and practised a subsistence economy, except for the production of barrels and vats, which instead guaranteed income for many families thanks to trade with various wine producers in Lazio. The local cuisine was consequently based on simple, locally available ingredients derived from the work of farmers and breeders. Gnoccacci (pasta made of water and flour) derive from this simple and typically rural tradition. To the water, salt and flour is added tomato pulp and porcini mushrooms, found in the chestnut woods surrounding the town. Oral testimonies tell us that in wartime the women of the village would gather wheat in the fields and take it to be ground at the local stone mill, now disused, run by the local Counts. The service was paid with a kg of pure flour, while they took home both the remaining flour and the waste from the milling. The dough was always made of water and flour strictly without eggs, since it was a waste to use them for the dough and above all because eggs were used to buy salt. And it is precisely because of the lack of eggs that this poor pasta, although shaped like a fettuccina, is called gnoccaccio. This name also derives from its shape, which is strictly irregular, an expression of the manual work of the village women. The product is the subject of a festival held every year in August.