Genoa, Liguria (specifically Recco and eastern Ligurian Riviera)
Pansoti ('pot-bellied') are the triangular stuffed pasta of Liguria, filled with preboggion — a traditional mixture of 14+ wild herbs and greens (borage, prescinseua curd, Swiss chard, pimpinella, wild fennel fronds) bound with egg and Parmigiano. Dressed with salsa di noci — a sauce of shelled walnuts, garlic, marjoram, prescinseua or ricotta, and olive oil pounded together — they are the Ligurian counterweight to pesto, showing that the same region has another great sauce that uses the same mortar-pounding technique.
Wild herb-filled belly pasta in a room-temperature walnut sauce — Liguria's other great pasta tradition, as distinctive as pesto but known only to those who go beyond the coast
{"Preboggion: the wild herb mixture can include up to 14 species; minimum must include borage, prescinseua, and wild fennel","Herbs blanched and squeezed dry; combined with prescinseua (or strained ricotta) and egg","Pasta dough: 00 flour and eggs with 20% white wine replacing part of the liquid (traditional)","Salsa di noci: blanched walnuts (skin removed), garlic, marjoram, prescinseua, olive oil — pound in mortar","Pansoti take 3–4 minutes to cook; sauce should be at room temperature when pasta is added"}
{"Prescinseua (Genoese curd cheese) is the authentic ingredient; strained ricotta with a drop of lemon juice is the closest substitute","The walnut sauce keeps 3 days refrigerated — make it ahead for better flavour integration","A drizzle of raw olive oil over the plated pansoti before the walnut sauce amplifies the Ligurian character"}
{"Using only spinach instead of the wild herb mixture — the dish loses its defining herbal complexity","Warm walnut sauce — the walnut paste becomes oily when heated","Pressing pansoti too flat — the filling is dense and the pasta must have a full belly of filling, not a thin layer"}
La Cucina di Liguria — Massimo Alberini