Pici al Ragù Toscano (Italian Tuscan Pici with Meat Ragù) A Tuscan meat ragù is not a Bolognese with a different accent. There is no milk in it and no cream, the wine is red rather than white, and the seasoning runs to bay and rosemary instead of nutmeg. It is built on a small soffritto, a good deal of beef, a little pork for fat, and three hours over the lowest flame the stove will hold. Pici are the thickest handmade strand in the Italian repertoire, flour and water alone,

Pici al Ragu di Cinta Senese (Traditional Italian Tuscan Hand Rolled Pasta with Cinta Senese Pork Ragu) Pici are the pasta of the Sienese countryside and the least mechanical shape in the Italian repertoire. Flour, water, a little olive oil, salt, and nothing else: no egg, no machine. Each strand is rolled under the palms to roughly the thickness of a pencil, irregular along its length, and that irregularity is the point. A smooth extruded strand carries sauce on its surface;

Pici all'Aglione (Italian Tuscan Pici with Aglione Tomato Sauce) Pici all'Aglione is a sauce built on one ingredient that almost disappeared. Aglione is not garlic as the rest of Italy knows it. It is a giant bulb of the Val di Chiana, closer to the leek than to the common clove, with segments weighing three ounces each and a flavour that is sweet and mild rather than pungent. Cooked slowly in olive oil until it collapses, it gives a tomato sauce a depth no quantity of ordina