Recipe: Strascinati al Sugo di Braciole – The Sunday Heartbeat of Bari

If orecchiette con le cime di rapa is Puglia’s weekday anthem, strascinati al sugo di braciole is its Sunday prayer.
It’s the smell that fills Bari’s narrow streets at noon — onions melting into oil, tomatoes simmering slowly, the air heavy with promise.
It’s the sound of plates clinking, of laughter echoing from balconies, of families gathering long before the pasta is ready.

Every region in Italy has its ritual of rest, but in Puglia, Sunday belongs to the sugo di braciole — a sauce so rich and slow that it feels like time itself is cooking. And the pasta that carries it best isn’t the famous orecchiette, but the lesser-known, lovingly made strascinati — the “dragged ones.”

The Art of Dragging Pasta

To make strascinati is to understand patience.
The name comes from strascinare, meaning “to drag,” and the process is exactly that: you roll a piece of dough and drag it gently across a wooden board. The roughness of the wood gives the pasta its texture; the hand gives it its soul.

Each piece is slightly oval, curled at the edges, smooth underneath and rough on top — the perfect shape for a sauce that clings and coats.
In the past, mothers and daughters would gather around a wide board and make hundreds of these, leaving them to dry on bedsheets in the courtyard.
They were meant for special days, and there was no day more special than Sunday.

Braciole: The Noble Roll of the South

The word braciola might mislead outsiders.
In the north, it means a pork chop.
In Bari, it means something entirely different — a thin slice of beef (or horse meat, in older traditions) rolled around parsley, garlic, and pecorino, tied with string, and simmered for hours in tomato sauce until tender enough to cut with a fork.

Each roll is a little parcel of flavor: the meat enriches the sauce; the sauce, in turn, softens the meat.
Together they create something dense, fragrant, and layered — a sauce that’s both hearty and refined.

And when poured over strascinati, every groove and curve of the pasta becomes a small vessel for that depth.

The Sunday Ceremony

Bari’s old town — Bari Vecchia — wakes slowly on Sundays.
Shutters open, radios hum, and the smell of sugo di braciole drifts from open windows.
You can walk through the streets and trace family meals by the scent: some sauces sharper with wine, others sweeter with onion or cloves.

Lunch begins late, after church or market, and it always unfolds the same way.
First, the pasta with the sauce.
Then, the braciole themselves, served as a second course with bread and olives.
No rush, no guilt, no phones — just food as it was meant to be: communal, deliberate, complete.

The Olive Oil Thread

Olive oil isn’t just an ingredient here — it’s the thread that ties everything together.
Puglia produces nearly half of Italy’s olive oil, and in Bari, it’s used as liberally as water.
The sauce begins with it, the pasta ends with it.
Locals prefer the Coratina variety, bold and peppery, or Bella di Cerignola, whose olives might even find their way into the sauce itself for sweetness and contrast.

Oil isn’t measured; it’s poured with intuition, the same way grandmothers add “just a handful” of salt or “a little bit” of wine.
Every family believes their oil is the best, and honestly, they’re probably all right.

Traditional Recipe: Strascinati al Sugo di Braciole

Serves: 4
Preparation Time: 30 minutes
Cooking Time: 2½ hours

Ingredients

For the Braciole:

• 8 thin slices of beef (about 100g each)
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 30g grated pecorino cheese
• A handful of flat-leaf parsley, chopped
• Salt and black pepper
• Kitchen string for tying

For the Sauce:

• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 800ml tomato passata
• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 100ml red wine
• 80ml extra virgin olive oil
• 4 Bella di Cerignola olives, chopped
• 1 bay leaf
• Salt and pepper to taste

For the Pasta:

• 400g strascinati (or orecchiette if unavailable)

Method

1. Prepare the Braciole
   Lay out the beef slices. Sprinkle each with garlic, parsley, pecorino, salt, and pepper.
   Roll tightly and tie with string to hold their shape.
2. Sear the Meat
   In a wide pot, heat olive oil. Brown the rolls on all sides until golden. Remove and set aside.
3. Build the Sauce
   In the same pot, sauté the onion until soft.
   Stir in tomato paste, then deglaze with red wine. Let it simmer for a minute before adding the tomato passata, bay leaf, and a little salt.
   Return the braciole to the pot, cover, and cook on low heat for about 2 hours, stirring occasionally.
   The sauce should thicken and darken, the braciole meltingly tender.
4. Cook the Pasta
   When the sauce is nearly done, cook strascinati in salted water until al dente.
5. Combine and Serve
   Toss the pasta in the sauce and plate generously.
   Serve the braciole separately with crusty bread to mop up the remaining juices.
   Finish with a drizzle of raw olive oil — it’s what turns good into unforgettable.

Plant-Based Version: Strascinati al Sugo di Olive e Pomodoro

When meat is replaced with olives, capers, and slow-cooked tomatoes, you get a sauce that’s just as rich, layered, and Pugliese — without losing its soul.

Ingredients

• 400g strascinati
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 700ml tomato passata
• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 100ml red wine (optional)
• 100g Bella di Cerignola or Leccino olives, pitted and halved
• 1 tbsp capers, rinsed
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 100ml extra virgin olive oil
• Salt, pepper, chili flakes to taste

Method

1. Heat olive oil and gently sauté onion and garlic until fragrant.
2. Add tomato paste, then deglaze with red wine.
3. Add passata, olives, capers, oregano, salt, and pepper.
   Let it simmer for 25–30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
4. Cook the pasta until al dente, then toss it in the sauce.
5. Finish with a drizzle of olive oil and, if desired, crushed almonds for texture.

It’s sunshine in a bowl — proof that Puglia’s soul doesn’t depend on meat, but on time, love, and oil.

The Spirit of Sunday

This dish isn’t about technique; it’s about tempo.
You can’t rush sugo di braciole. The onions need to sigh, the tomatoes need to darken, the oil needs to weave everything together.
You cook it the way you’d tell a long story — slowly, honestly, with room to breathe.

In Bari, people say the best way to know if your sauce is ready is by the sound.
At first, it simmers loudly, impatiently.
Then, after a couple of hours, it goes quiet — just a lazy bubble now and then. That’s when you know it’s ready. The sauce has settled into itself. So has the day.

Fun Facts

• The braciole are always tied with cotton string — and never cut before serving, or you’ll “release the luck.”
• Horse meat was once traditional, believed to bring strength and vitality.
• The sauce was often cooked overnight on the embers of a fireplace, ready for the next day’s feast.
• In Bari, children often eat their pasta with sauce first, then use a piece of bread to scoop up a bit of meat — their own form of dessert.
• Some families add a few whole olives to the sauce near the end, both for flavor and symbolism — the olive, after all, is the soul of Puglia.

A Taste That Anchors Time

Strascinati al sugo di braciole isn’t just a recipe; it’s a calendar entry.
It marks Sunday, it marks togetherness, it marks the luxury of slowing down.
The sauce doesn’t belong to one family — it belongs to the collective rhythm of a region that still measures its weeks by the meals that end them.

Every strascinato, every drop of oil, every long-simmered tomato tells the same story:
that love in Puglia is served slowly, eaten communally, and remembered forever.