The shepherds' boiled-mutton dish of Capracotta, a high village of the Alto Molise, where adult sheep are cut into pieces — pezze, hence pezzata — and simmered for hours in a great pot with little more than water, salt, tomato and wild mountain herbs until the strong, fatty meat falls tender. It is rustic and unadorned, the broth left to skim itself clear of fat as it cooks, and is eaten straight from the cauldron in big bowls with bread. Once the cook-out of the herdsmen on the summer pastures, it survives as the centrepiece of a famous July festival that draws crowds to the mountains to eat it.
Pezzata is the signature dish of Capracotta, a village set above 1,400 metres in the Alto Molise and one of the highest comuni of the Apennines, with a history rooted in sheep and transhumance — the seasonal droving of flocks along the ancient grass roads, the tratturi, between these summer pastures and the warmer plains of Puglia for winter. The dish is the herdsmen's own cooking, a way to use the tougher meat of grown sheep by long boiling in the open, and its name comes from the meat being cut into pezze, pieces. It is celebrated each July at the Sagra della Pezzata, a long-running village festival at which the mutton is cooked in quantity in great pots on the meadows above the town; precise early dates for the dish are not documented, but it is a well-attested pastoral tradition of the area.
Honest, big-flavoured and deeply savoury. The mutton is full and faintly gamey, the long simmer leaving it soft enough to come off the bone yet still firm-textured, and the fat that survives lends richness without greasiness because so much is skimmed away. The broth is light and clean, sharpened by tomato and perfumed with the resinous lift of wild herbs, and it carries the meat's flavour in every spoonful. A good pot is well-skimmed and clear, the meat tender and the seasoning plain but assertive; a poorly tended one is muddy with fat and the mutton stays tough.
This is slow moist cooking aimed squarely at tough, mature meat. Adult sheep is high in collagen and connective tissue, which only converts to soft gelatin under a long, gentle simmer well below a hard boil, so the pot is held at a bare bubble for hours until the fibres slacken and the meat turns tender while the broth thickens slightly with dissolved gelatin. Skimming is the other key move: mutton renders a great deal of strong-flavoured fat, and lifting it off through the cook keeps the broth clean and the dish from being heavy. The tomato adds acidity that brightens the fatty meat and helps soften it, while the wild herbs are aromatic and go in to perfume the broth, their volatile oils released into the hot liquid.
Variations
The seasoning stays minimal by design — water, salt, tomato and herbs such as wild fennel, mint or savory — and households differ chiefly in the herbs and in how much tomato, if any, they add; some keep it almost white. The cut is mixed pieces of adult sheep, bone in, and a good measure of fat is wanted for flavour. It is essentially a festival and communal dish, made in large pots and shared, and is close in spirit to the pecora cooking of neighbouring Abruzzo, such as pecora alla cottora boiled in its copper cauldron; in everyday kitchens it is simply scaled down and served with plenty of country bread.
On the Palate
Where Pezzata di Capracotta sits in the Italian flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 8How it's made
7 steps · 40 min
- 115 min
Cut pieces of adult sheep, bone in, into rough chunks, keeping a good share of the fat for flavour.
- 215 min
Put the meat in a large heavy pot, cover well with cold water, bring slowly to a simmer and salt.
- 320 min
As it heats, skim off the rising foam and fat repeatedly to keep the broth clean.
Watch outSkim the rising foam and fat repeatedly as it heats — mutton renders a great deal of strong fat, and lifting it off is what keeps the broth clean instead of heavy.
- 45 min
Add chopped tomato and a bundle of wild herbs such as fennel, mint or savory.
- 5160 min
Simmer at a bare bubble, partly covered, for two to three hours, skimming now and then, until the meat is fork-tender.
Watch outHold it at a bare bubble, never a hard boil, for two to three hours — mature sheep is high in collagen that only melts to tender gelatin under long, gentle heat.
- 610 min
Check the seasoning, let the pot settle so any last fat can be lifted off, and rest briefly.
- 75 min
Ladle the meat and clear broth into deep bowls and serve hot with plenty of country bread.
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