Tajarin is the Piedmontese name for tagliolini, a very thin hand-cut egg ribbon pasta from the Langhe and Monferrato hills. What sets it apart is the dough, made rich and golden with a high proportion of egg yolks — purists insist on at least 30 per kilogram of flour, often 30 to 40, sometimes more. The sheet is rolled out thin, folded, and sliced into strands barely a millimetre or two wide. It is dressed very simply, classically with butter and sage or with a meat ragù, and in autumn crowned with shavings of the white truffle of Alba.
Tajarin is documented in the farmhouse kitchens of the Langhe and Monferrato from around the 15th century, and the Piedmontese word — older than the standard Italian taglierini — derives from tajé, to cut. It was long a festive pasta reserved for Sundays and special occasions such as weddings, when a lavish count of yolks signalled prosperity; what had once been a dough of just a few eggs grew, over time, into the yolk-heavy version prized today. The pairing with the white truffle of Alba reflects its home territory, the same Langhe hills where the truffle is gathered.
Almost weightless on the fork, the strands are tender and faintly springy, with a clean richness from the yolks rather than any heaviness. With butter and sage the pasta itself leads — eggy, slightly sweet, glossed in nut-brown butter. Under white truffle the aroma takes over, garlicky and earthy, while the warm pasta carries it to the nose. Good tajarin is barely thicker than thread and just holds together; rolled too thick or overcooked, it turns soft and doughy and loses its delicacy.
The many yolks are what make this pasta. Egg yolk is rich in fat and in the emulsifier lecithin, which coats the flour's starch and tenderises the dough while binding it without much water, so the strands stay supple yet do not turn gummy. That high-yolk, low-water dough is firm and elastic and demands hard kneading; adding water or egg white to ease the work is traditionally forbidden, as it would slacken the dough and dull the colour. Because the strands are so thin, they cook in well under two minutes, and the porous fresh surface grips a simple butter sauce or releases truffle aroma the moment they hit the heat.
Variations
The two canonical dressings are butter and sage and a long-simmered meat ragù, often of the Piedmontese kind enriched with offal; in white-truffle season the pasta is served with little more than butter so the truffle stands alone. Some cooks add a few whole eggs alongside the yolks, and the precise yolk count varies from household to household. Tajarin belongs to the wider family of thin egg pastas that includes Emilia-Romagna's tagliolini and taglierini, from which it is distinguished mainly by its very high yolk content.
On the Palate
Where Tajarin sits in the Italian flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 4How it's made
8 steps · 1 hour active + 30 min waiting
- 13 min
Mound the flour on a board, make a well, and add the egg yolks and a pinch of salt.
- 212 min
Work the yolks into the flour and knead hard for about 10 minutes into a firm, smooth, deep-yellow dough; wrap and rest for 30 minutes.
Watch outKnead the yolk-rich dough hard for about 10 minutes into a firm, deep-yellow ball — this low-water dough needs the work to turn smooth and elastic without going gummy.
- 320 min
Roll the dough out into a very thin sheet, by machine or with a rolling pin, then let it dry slightly until leathery.
Watch outRoll the sheet very thin, then let it dry just to leathery — too wet and the strands stick together when you cut, too dry and they crack.
- 412 min
Flour the sheet, roll it loosely, and cut it into strands one to two millimetres wide, then unfurl and dust with flour.
- 510 min
Bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil.
- 66 min
Meanwhile melt the butter gently with the sage leaves until fragrant and lightly browned.
- 72 min
Cook the tajarin until just tender, well under two minutes, and drain, keeping a little pasta water.
Watch outCook these fine strands under two minutes — they're so thin they go from firm to overcooked in a blink, and they keep softening in the butter.
- 83 min
Toss the pasta in the sage butter with a splash of the water, and finish with grated cheese or, in season, shaved white truffle.
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