(Filindeu)
Filindeu, literally meaning the threads of God, is a variety of Italian pasta prepared exclusively in the Sardinian province of Nuoro. It is the world’s rarest and most endangered pasta variety - allegedly, only one woman named Paola Abraini still makes it.
The dough is made with the usual ingredients: durum wheat semolina, water, and a pinch of salt, but the trick is in the technique - the dough needs to be kneaded until it reaches a very soft and elastic texture, achieved by knowingly moisturizing the dough with salted water when needed.
The dough is stretched by hands into needle-thin yarns, placed on a special wooden tray called fundu in three separate layers (each added at a different angle), and then dried in the sun. Filindeu pasta is so time-consuming and hard to prepare that for the past 200 years it used to be a sacred dish, served only to those who complete a 33km pilgrimage from Nuoro to the village of Lula for the biannual Feast of San Francesco.
Upon arrival, the pilgrims are awarded with a bowl of fillindeu pasta, cooked and served in a rich sheep broth and topped with a generous portion of local sheep’s milk cheese.
