Wednesday evening, cuddles. We dine alone in a restaurant in Modena, a trusted person recommended it to us. Distinguishing feature: he is not mentioned in any guide. At the entrance, a nice counter with bottles of bitters welcomes you, the environment is very classic, like a bourgeois restaurant: white tablecloths, wood, a very attentive service. In the room, father and daughter take turns, at least that’s how it seems to us from the way they look at each other, first lovingly, then in mock scowl. After a day of experimental tastings on that day Cibusin Parma, we want rearrange ideas: fried dumpling, tortellini in broth and a bottle of Lambrusco di Sorbara, refermented in the bottle. There wine list it has also remained firm in time, Ca’ dei Frati, a lot of Piedmont and Tuscany already seen, some good regional labels. A breath of fresh air in the choices wouldn’t hurt, but everything is consistent within these walls. White Trattoria has been welcoming customers to Modena since 1947.
There eggplant parmigiana as a welcome it leaves no mark, then the ritual begins fried dumpling. We take with our hands a cloud that has fallen from the sky – cooking in the phenomenal pan – we lay a slice of culatello and finish with a dip in the homemade corn jam, the legendary Vignola cherries: succulent and with a acidic edge. They fit us divinely, in short, we enjoy them. Let’s slow down the pace to make everything last a little longer: the round of greavesa well-seasoned salami (Spigaroli?), inviting raw ham, the right mortadella and a culatello serious, with that wonderful cellar scent which takes us back to some old Trebbiano di Valentini. Brave, we almost want to ask for an encore, we give up. We hadn’t eaten one in a while fried dumpling of this level, dry, light, fragrant.
Let’s get familiar. «Grandma White it started from Pavignane, a small hamlet in the Modena area, during the War it became the sorting center for animals, in 1947 it moved to Modena”, attacks the owner Giuseppe Tartini while he seems to dance in the room with the right timing. The service is old school, attentive and thoughtful, the gaze never taken away from the customer. We are on the outskirts of the historic center of Modena, in what was an old farmhouse, which also housed animals, with the rooms upstairs. «This place has lived through the history of Italy. In the 1950s they came with animals and wolf packs. In the Sixties it was frequented mainly by university students, between the Seventies and Eighties it was the time of doctors and professors”, continues Giuseppe. Among the customers there is also an unknown name in the city: Massimo Bottura. «He often comes to eat here, the last time he slipped into the kitchen and made food for himself».
The tortellini arrive. The broth is sumptuoustasty and harmonious, adding some parmesan would be a… crime punishable between three and five years; the pastry is well filled, with a sweetly raised nutmeg. Let’s leave aside the critical apparatus, such as the suggested thirty seconds less cooking time. In front of a broth so complete we cannot help but immerse ourselves in the atmosphere so far from the fashions of Trattoria Bianca. At the next table a couple tastes some tortelloni ricotta and spinach, there are those who are already on the second: priest’s hat with mashed potatoes. “Finding staff has become impossible, we rest at the weekend, we are closed on Saturday and Sunday.” We would like to close with the sponge cake and custard, Trattoria Bianca is a trifle place. On the other hand, several legends place his birth precisely in these parts. Yet, due to some strange mental whim, or mere sense of guilt, we decide to leave something unturned. It will be for the next visit. So we pay, average price 55 euros, and we relax on the avenues of Modena. Beautiful and silent as we have never seen it.
