top of page
Writer's pictureRobyn Dwyer

Little Travel Stories: Rita's pasta, Poggio Moiano, Italy

Poggio Moiano, Italy, June 2019, late evening facebook post

Behind every plate of homemade pasta lies a story...

This pasta was made by Rina, age 83. Rina is and was the matriarch of the family, all her life taking care of her late husband Gino’s business doing the accounts and raising her two sons while being a prominent and loved member of her community. Every morning she wakes up at 4am and hand makes 20 eggs worth of pasta (which means pasta for 20 people) most of it she gives away to the villagers if it is not going to be used in her son’s restaurant. Her son and her late husband were master builders and the restaurant I am in is an old Olive storehouse renovated by her son, to be turned into this gorgeous restaurant.

After finishing making the pasta (all by hand with no machine at all, just a rolling pin, deft hands and folding skills and a knife), she heads down to the cemetery, every morning without fail, at 7.30am to spend some time talking with Gino, as she has done for the past 25 years. She misses him greatly but she is not sad I am told. Sometimes she goes twice a day to chat with him. She lives alone on the fourth floor of an apartment block completely owned by her and goes up and down the 99 stairs sometimes four or five times a day. She chooses to live alone I am told. She has time to visit the people in her village who are lonely or sick and she is extremely generous with her time and her skills.

In this little town, there is a tradition which celebrates every year the Virgin of Sorrows (actually some beautiful images of this around) on 15 September. There are 85 ‘sisters’ of the Virgin of Sorrows, who take care of the organisation of this festival which is important for bringing the whole community and smaller country areas together on one day to share a massive feast together. Each year a name is pulled from the lottery for the principal ‘sister’ who has the honour of hosting the festival in or near her home as well as having the sacred image of the Virgin for a whole year in her home. Rina had been waiting 75 years for her name to be chosen from the lottery - and this year it was finally chosen. You can imagine her happiness!!! And so, last Sunday, she got up as usual at 4am but made 300 cannelloni with the ragù (bolognese sauce) by herself.. for 300 people and it was her greatest joy to finally have her moment to do so! Good god, I nearly cried when I heard this story - I was so happy at the idea of how happy she must have been.. waiting 75 years for this day! ... and what an honour that I would be eating pasta made from this woman who has given her whole life to her family and community ... and that I was entertained with the story (which went on for a lot longer than this post) by her son, her daughter-in-law, and her daughter-in-Law’s cousin (by marriage) who each came out of the kitchen at various times to add details to the story, show photos and videos and debate the facts haha fantastic... And that’s the thing about Italy.. pasta, or indeed any traditional meal or recipe ALWAYS comes with a good story ❤️


23 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Komentáře


bottom of page