Friggione (ancient recipe)

Solemnly declared by the Bologna Bentivoglio Delegation of the Accademia Italiana della Cucina and deposited with notarial deed at the Chamber of Commerce of Bologna, in Palazzo della Mercanzia, on the 19th of November, 2003.

Ingredients

• 4 kg white onions
• 300 g fresh peeled tomatoes
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon kitchen
• salt
• 2 tablespoons lard

Preparation

Cut the onions into very thin slices and leave them to rest for at least 2 hours with salt and sugar. Take an aluminum pan and add the onion with its liquid and the lard, cook on a low flame stirring with the wooden spoon until the mixture has a hazel-brown color, making sure that it does not stick to the bottom of the pan, it will take about two hours. Add the chopped tomatoes to the onion and keep on stirring for on hour and half to finish the cooking process. When the lard starts to bubble and the onion with tomato is creamy the Friggione is ready. This old recipe has been taken from a manuscript of Mrs. Maria Manfredi Baschieri and is an old recipe from Bologna, dating back to 1886. Today the proportions of the Friggione recipe have changed a lot, as well as people's tastes, so according to today's recipe 500 g of tomato sauce are added to 800 g of white onion.

At this ancient recipe we can add the classic recipe of Friggione Bolognese, as we are used to eat nowadays. It has a different amount of ingredients and for that reason the Academy Delegation provided for a new deposit, with an act by the notary Salvatore Chiaramonte the 14th May 2008 and registered at the Chamber of Commerce in 2010.

Here the recipe Ingredients

• 1.5 kg yellow onions in thin slices slightly fried in lard
• 1 kg mature fresh ripe tomatoes, cut into pieces, blanched, peeled and seedless
• 400 g thin sliced bacon and slightly fried
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 tablespoon lard a hint of chilly
• salt

Preparation

Slice the onios and let them macerate with salt and sugar for two hours, pour all in a pan, add chopped tomatoes and let them cook half an hour. Then add the sauted bacon and finish cooking slowly at least ¾ hours, until the sauce is reduced and flavourful. The Friggione is excellent to serve with the great Bolognese boiled meat.