Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
OFF THE BEATEN TRACK
MAKING SPAGHETTI
In the medieval hilltop village of Lari (pop 8755), across from the thick red-brick walls of its huge
11th-century fortress, is an address no gastronome should miss:
Martelli
(
www.martelli.info
;
Via San
Martino 3; 10am-noon & 3-4pm Mon, Tue, Thu & Fri). Behind the canary-yellow facade of this
pastificio trazionale
(artisanal pasta maker), 35km southeast of Pisa, seven members of the Martelli
family beaver away to make 1 tonne of pasta a year - an output any industrial factory would achieve
in a matter of hours. Slowly kneaded dough is fed through traditional bronze moulds to create spa-
ghetti and spaghettini, penne, macaroni and fusilli. This is then air-dried for 50 hours (compared to
three hours industrially), cut and packaged by hand in Martelli's trademark canary-yellow paper pack-
ets, designed to evoke the pre-1960s yellow paper that pasta in Tuscany was traditionally wrapped in
at the market before industrial packaging changed it all.
Around since 1926, Martelli pasta - chewier and coarser in texture than many, meaning it marries
particularly well with meat sauces and game - is shipped all over the world and sold in many a gour-
met store, Harrods of London included. In Lari, buy it for €4 per kilogram around the corner from the
workshop at village cafe and tobacconist,
La Bottega delle Specialità
(Via Diaz 12-14); and taste it
for lunch at restaurants in the village.
Workshop tours are completely informal. Stick your head around the shopfront, ask to visit (Luca,
whose grandfather opened Martelli in 1926, speaks English), then nip down the neighbouring alley to
reach the small room where the spaghetti action takes place.
Getting Around
ATL
(
www.atl.livorno.it
;
Largo Duomo 2)
has a service (bus 1) from the main train station to
Porto Mediceo (€1.20, on board €1.70), via Piazza Grande. To reach Stazione Marittima,
take bus 1 to Piazza Grande then bus 5 from Via Cogorano, just off Piazza Grande.
