Stufatu di Cinghiale — Wild Boar Slow Braise

Corsica — interior maquis regions; Niolu, Castagniccia, Alta Rocca most associated. Autumn-winter game season.

Wild boar — cinghiale in Italian, porcu salvaticu in Corsican — has roamed the island's maquis since antiquity, and its preparation in the stufatu tradition is the single most emblematic game dish of the Corsican interior. The animal is butchered into large bone-in pieces — shoulder, neck, leg — and marinated overnight in Niellucciu rouge, juniper berries, bay, thyme, and rosemary. The following day the meat is browned deeply in Corsican olive-oil, the marinade strained and added back with additional tomato, garlic, panzetta, and fresh maquis herbs, and the sealed tianu goes into a low oven for four to five hours. Wild Corsican boar is leaner and more intensely flavoured than farmed wild boar — the diet of acorns, chestnuts, maquis berries, and roots produces a dark, mineral-rich meat that requires the full low-and-slow treatment to tenderise without drying. The finished stew is served over thick pulenda — the chestnut sweetness and the boar's wild intensity forming one of the island's most complete and historically rooted flavour pairings.

• Pebronata di cinghiale (Corsica — pepper-variant of the same boar braise)
• Cacciatore di cinghiale (Tuscany — tomato-based boar braise, cognate)
• Sanglier à la gasconnaise (Gascony — armagnac-braised boar, French mainland parallel)

Dark, mineral, gamey intensity from wild pasture; Niellucciu tannin; juniper-maquis herb throughout; chestnut sweetness contrast in pulenda pairing.