Tagliatelle

Tagliatelle is the egg-ribbon pasta of Emilia-Romagna, and Bologna guards it like a monument: in 1972 the Accademia Italiana della Cucina deposited a solid-gold tagliatella at the city's Chamber of Commerce, fixing the proper cooked width at eight millimeters — precisely one twelve-thousand-two-hundred-seventieth of the nearby Torre degli Asinelli. The name comes from tagliare, "to cut," for the way a thin sheet of dough is rolled, folded, and sliced into ribbons. A charming legend credits a Renaissance cook with modeling the strands on Lucrezia Borgia's golden hair, but that story was invented centuries after the fact. What isn't in dispute is the pairing: tagliatelle al ragù, the slow beef-and-pork sauce of Bologna, is the dish the world clumsily renamed "spaghetti bolognese."

Flat ribbons of fresh egg dough, cut about six to seven millimeters wide raw and settling near eight once cooked — narrower than pappardelle, a touch wider than its Roman cousin fettuccine. The surface matters as much as the width: rolled on wood with a wooden pin, the ribbon takes on a faint roughness that sauce clings to. Egg is non-negotiable; without it, this isn't tagliatelle.

The width is calibrated for ragù. Broad enough to carry a meaty, slow-cooked sauce in roughly equal measure, porous enough to hold it, tagliatelle is built for the rich condiments of Emilia-Romagna rather than for oil or seafood. Its relatives scale to the sauce: tagliolini thin for broth and truffle, pappardelle wide for game.

1. 01Al ragù bologneseThe canonical match: slow beef and pork, soffritto, a little tomato.
2. 02Burro e ParmigianoButter and Parmigiano-Reggiano; lets the egg dough shine.
3. 03Ai funghi porciniPorcini and butter, an autumn Emilian staple.
4. 04Al tartufoShaved white truffle over butter, the northern splurge.