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X Italian Soups
Sagnatelle con Brodo
Originated from: Casacalenda, Molise, Italy
Occasion: Special times
Contributed by: Mary Melfi (her mother's recipe)

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Ingredients

For the Base

Chicken broth [For the recipe for a Molise-style chicken broth see "Traditional Meat Dishes/ Traditional Chicken Broth"]*

For the Sagnatelle Dough [For the recipe see "Everyday Pasta Dough"]**
4 cups flour
about 1 1/2 cups water

For Cooking Pasta
A large pot of water for cooking pasta
1 tablespoon of salt (for water)

For Garnishing
about 2 tablespoons fresh parsley, finely chopped
Grated Parmesan cheese


*Any type of chicken broth can be used for this dish, bearing in mind that the quality of the broth is essential, as it is The main ingredient

**Spellings for "sagnatelle" and/or "sagnetelle" vary



Directions

To Prepare the Sagnatelle Strips



1. Make "Everyday Pasta Dough" [See recipe]

2. To make "sagnatelle" cut pasta sheets into thin strips -- 6 inches long by 1/8 inch wide ("Sagnatelle" resemble spaghetti strips, except they're much shorter in length). If one has a pasta maker one simply passes the pasta sheets through the spaghetti cutter and then cuts them up. If one is making them by hand, one rolls up a pasta sheet (about 6 inches long by 6 inches wide) and then one cuts thin strips with a knife.

3. Place the cut strips on a floured wooden board, in a semi-circular position, so that after they are air-dried they look like half circles.

4. Lightly flour the cut-up sagnatelle so that they do not stick together. Let it air-dry while you are making the broth.



To Prepare the Broth



1. Make home-made chicken broth [See recipe]. If using store-bought chicken cubes, cook two or three pieces of chicken in the resulting broth.

2. Remove the chicken meat (cooked in the broth) from the bones, break it into chunks, and then into very thin strips (Works best if one uses one's hands).

3. Discard the bones and return the strips of chicken meat to the broth.

4. Keep warm while cooking pasta.



To prepare the dish



1. Bring a large pot of water to boil. Add a tablespoon of salt to the water.

2. Place the sagnatelle in the water and cook until they are "done" (Takes a few minutes).

3. Drain.

4. Place the cooked sagnatelle in a bowl and add about a cup of broth (NEVER mix pasta with all the broth or sauce that one has made. One has to do it in stages, as this will ensure that each individual bowl one serves gets the right amount of broth or sauce. Besides, pasta absorbs liquids rather quickly, so that if one combines the liquids and solids, a lot of the liquid simply "disappears.")

4. Place the chicken broth in individual bowls, making sure each bowl gets a sufficient amount of chicken strips.

5. Add a bit of sagnatelle in each bowl.

6. Garnish with chopped parsley and grated Parmesan cheese.

7. Serve warm.




Notes

In the Southern Italian countryside, prior to World War II, chicken soup was only made for very special occasions, and/or if someone in the family was ill (Italians, like the French and German, believed chicken soup had medicinal value). If someone were ill and chicken soup was prepared, it would be served as The main meal. It would not be considered a first course. Of course, if it were served at a wedding banquet, then it would have been seen as a first course. In any case, sagnatelle would generally be added to the chicken broth. However, as previously noted, chicken soup was rarely cooked up. For everyday consumption most cooks simply made broth with tomatoes, onions and celery [For recipe see Sagnatelle con Brodo, Version I]. When Italians from Molise immigrated to North America they made chicken soup any old time. Most cooks, (including my mother) did not make home-made sagnatelle to add to the chicken soup. They used store-bought spaghetti -- they would break it with their hands (about 4 inches long), cut the spaghetti in boiling water, and then place the cooked spaghetti in a bowl and toss it with a bit of broth etc. Growing up I simply assumed this is how the dish was served in Italy. I had no idea that home-made "sagnatelle" was used and/or that by using "sagnatelle" instead of store-bought spaghetti the taste of the dish would dramatically improve.... Photo: by the contributor.

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