Pici :a traditional Tuscan fresh pasta

Pici :a traditional Tuscan fresh pasta with 3 ingredients,  no machine , only your hands 

Pici are a fresh Tuscan pasta, similar to thick, handmade spaghetti, with ancient origins dating back to the Etruscans, as suggested by frescoes in the Etruscan Tomb in Tarquinia. Originally a peasant dish made with flour, water, and oil, it spread throughout Tuscany, becoming a gastronomic symbol. Today, it is served with various sauces such as aglione, ragù, or briciole.

PICI

Ingredient List

Serving 2 persons

• 150 gr.= 5 oz. Flour 00/all-purpose/plain flour + some extra  to work
• 1 Pinch =1/2 tsp. fine salt
• 1 tbsp. EVOO
• 76 ml = 5 tbsp. water

     1/8 cup coarse salt  for the boiling water where to cook the pici (if available,otherwise  fine  salt)

Equipment Needed

• Bowl where to mix by hand
• Surface where to work the pici dough (table, board etc.)
• Rolling pin  (wooden if available)
• Knife  or better a pasta cutter
• Bench scraper
• Large Pot where to cook the pici
• Colander
• Trays or towels where to dry the  pici

Preparation

1. In a bowl pour the flour,  oil and a pinch of salt.
   Add the water to the flour ,not all at once as different factors such as the temperature and humidity will affect how your pasta dough comes together
2. Add water/additional flour sparingly as needed until your dough comes together and is tacky and not at all sticky.
3. Mix and continue to knead with hands, or rather with the wrist, until a moist and compact consistency is reached.
4. Keep kneading the pasta until it becomes elastic in texture.
5. Leave the dough for half an hour in the bowl (not always necessary)
6. Roll the dough to 1/2cm =0.15 inch
7. Cut strips of 1cm.= 0.4 inch

1. At this point, take every single strip of dough and with the palm of the hand roll the strip to thin it and round the edges .
2. Place each finished strip on a tray with a lot of flour. Naturally they will be irregular which is typical of this Tuscan pasta

To cook the pici

1. Fill a large pot with water.

2. When the water is simmering salt it  generously.

3. Add the pici .

4. Cook  for about 6 minutes.

5. Drain them and transfer to the serving bowl with some of the sauce you’re serving them with.

If you don’t want to cook them when you make them, you can leave them out to get dry and keep them dried in a  container.

When dried it takes 12 minutes to cook them.

The success of pici comes from the extreme simplicity of the ingredients, but also from the remarkable skill passed down through generations, indispensable for the preparation and manual assembly of the pici themselves, the so-called “appiciatura.” Entire communities in the Siena area hold their own secret—egg yes, egg not , and flour kind—and no family or community is willing to reveal it, jealously guarding their uniqueness.

 History and Name of Pici

Some maintain that pici date back to the Etruscan era, as they were already depicted in a depiction inside the famous Tomb of the Leopards in Tarquinia.
Others attribute the origin of pici, and the name itself, to Marcus Gavius Apicius, a renowned Roman gastronome, cook, and writer who lived between the 1st century BC and the 1st century AD
For others the name derives from the gesture made with the palm of the hand to shape the dough into a picio, which in Tuscan culinary jargon is the verb “appiciare.” Or perhaps the opposite, that “appiciare” derives from the term picio and not vice versa.

How to serve Pici

Traditionally, this pasta, being a humble, rural dish, was eaten with just a little “good oil” or chopped onion and salt. But every community or small town offers its own variation of this extraordinary dish.

The best known sauce  pici are served with is “all’aglione,(big garlic)” a thick sauce made with tomato, oil, garlic, and chili pepper. Then the sauce is generally made with breadcrumbs, made from stale bread sautéed in oil, garlic, and chili pepper.

In other places pici are served with “sugo bianco di nana” (white duck sauce) ,with meat sauce or topped with cacio e pepe (cheese and pepper). In Montalcino, however, the so-called “pinci” were served with a rich ragù of veal, chicken, sausage. In the mountains, pici are topped with fresh mountain mushrooms while at Lake Chiusi, you can enjoy pici with a sauce made from pike roe.

Pici, however they are served on our tables, with meat sauce or garlic, with breadcrumbs or cacio e pepe, with white nana ragù or with porcini mushrooms, as traditional condiments ,they are also delicious with tomato sauce, ragù, pesto, 4 cheeses, rocket/arucola, Taleggio cheese and chives .

Buon appetito !