tortellini – Venus'navel

The ingredients for almost 1.5 kg of tortellini (about 10 servings) are:
for the stuffing:
400 gr of pork loin
200 gr of Parmesan cheese from Reggio
200 gr of Parma ham
200 gr of Bologna mortadella
1 egg
abundant grated nutmeg
milk as requiredShow more

for pasta:
4 eggs
350 grams of durum wheat flour
50 grams of soft wheat flour
1 tablespoon of olive oil

The origins of the tortellino are ambiguous, steeped in tales and legends, involving historical characters and divinities. Venus comes first of all. Yes, because it is from his navel that the product would take shape. The legend traces it all back to the episode of the Kidnapped Bucket, which resulted in one of the great battles of the Middle Ages, that of 1325 between Bologna and Modena. The triggering cause was the theft of a worm-eaten bucket. Following the narration of the Modenese poet Alessandro Tassoni in 1624, then resumed in the 19th century by Giuseppe Ceri, the divinity Venus, Bacchus and Mars also took part in the battle, siding with the people of Modena. After spending the night in an inn in Castelfranco, Venus was surprised completely naked by the owner who went to wake her up. The enthralled man tried to reproduce its features, specifically the splendid navel, with a handkerchief of pasta. Given the dispute over the paternity of the tortellino between the two Emilian cities of Modena and Bologna, it is certainly no coincidence that Ceri places the birth of the dish in Castelfranco, a town on the border between the two provinces. The only certainty is that the homeland is Emilia.

thanks to Vlad Gluschenko - Patterns in the Sky - for the background music