Everything about Mortadella totally explained
Mortadella pronounced /morta'dɛl:a/ is an
Italian cold cut (
salume) made of finely hashed/ground heat-cured
pork sausage which incorporates at least 15% small cubes of pork fat (principally the hard fat from the neck of the pig). It is delicately flavored with spices, including whole or ground
black pepper,
myrtle berries,
nutmeg, and
coriander.
Traditionally the pork filling was ground to a paste using a large mortar (
mortaio) and pestle. Two Roman funerary stele in the archaeological museum of Bologna show such mortars. Alternatively, according to Cortelazzo and Zolli
Dizionario Etimologico della Lingua Italiana 1979-88, Mortadella gets its name from a
Roman sausage flavored with myrtle in place of pepper.
The Romans called the sausage
farcimen mirtatum. Anna del Conte (
The Gastronomy of Italy 2001) found a sausage mentioned in a document of the official body of meat preservers in Bologna dated 1376 that may be mortadella.
Mortadella originated in
Bologna, the capital of
Emilia-Romagna; elsewhere in Italy it may be made either in the Bolognese manner or in a distinctively local style. The mortadella of
Prato is a
Tuscan speciality flavoured with pounded garlic. The mortadella of
Amatrice, high in the
Apennines of northern
Lazio, is unusual in being lightly smoked.
Mortadella Bologna has
Protected Geographical Indication status under
European Union Law. The zone of production is extensive: as well as
Emilia-Romagna and the neighbouring regions of
Piedmont,
Lombardy,
Veneto,
Marche and
Tuscany, it includes Lazio and
Trentino.
The Italian politician
Romano Prodi,
prime minister and former President of the
European Commission from 1999 to 2004, lives in
Bologna (but he was born in
Reggio Emilia) and is usually nicknamed "Mortadella" by the Italian press because of his origin and presumed resemblance to the pale pink sausage.
Abroad
A similar commercial product that omits the cubes of pork fat, called
bologna, is popular in the
United States. It is also known as polony in the
United Kingdom.
In several Arab and Muslim countries,
Halal mortadella is sold, which is made from chicken, beef, or turkey.
Mortadella is also very popular in
Argentina,
Brazil and
Uruguay, thanks to the large number of Italian immigrants established in these countries in the early
20th century. The normal spelling in these countries, however, is
mortadela.
It is also very popular in
Spain and
Portugal, where a variety with
pepper and
olives is widely consumed, especially in sandwiches. Sometimes, in Spain, the standard mortadella is referred to as
Mortadela italiana ("Italian mortadella"), because there's a local variant named
Catalana or "Catalan mortadella". It's also popular in
Iran, albeit usually made with beef or lamb, and called
martadella or, more commonly,
cawlbawss (compare
Polish kiełbasa', Hungarian kolbász
, from Turkish külbastı
).
Further Information
Get more info on 'Mortadella'.
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