Ellis, Rocco and Pasta Madre Day

Tomorrow, on Saturday 2nd February, Pasta Madre Day, the day dedicated to mother yeast, will be celebrated. More and more popular in the past few years, it would be a mistake to call it natural yeast to distinguish it from brewer’s yeast, because even the latter is a natural product, except it’s likely to be of a lower quality, especially due to the use one makes for bread and pizza. Besides, as it is trendy, terribly trendy, to trot out natural products, it’s best to stress that mother yeast needs to be alive. It could in fact be the case that the mother yeast is dead and gone, just a powder used in the dough only to cheat people. It could happen in the case of the big food industry, of those realities that need to reassure the consumers using the right words for the wrong ends.

This one, in particular, is certainly not the case. Just a visit to the event’s website is enough for you to desire to have in your own home some mother yeast. For some it’s a religion, a second job, a constant commitment, like a family dog. Of course, you don’t need to take the mother yeast for a walk outside, two or three times a day, but if you ignore it and forget it in the fridge, you can say goodbye to it after a week. It happens often: you get enthusiastic about a particular godly bread, ask for a small vase of mother yeast, then, once the elation of the moment is over, you discover that it needs to be looked after like a Labrador Retriever, and you soon get bored, you give up.

So it’s best to leave the caring of the matter to those who really know it, as their job or hobby, as is the case, for example, of pastry-chef Ellis Palano and journalist Paola Sucato. While he pulls breads and cakes out of the oven at Pasta Madre, in via Corio 8 in Milan, tel. +39.02.55190020, she edits a blog called Ci_Polla. Ellis is from Sacile, in Friuli, and until August 2010 he was the owner of Namura; he then sold it and, since the following April, he has been a pillar in a place with a perfectly-fitting name, Pasta Madre. Of course, there’s the content, not just the sign outside: lots of content because over there, close to Porta Romana, the shutter is pulled up for the 8 am breakfast and pulled down to go to bed at midnight. Depending on the time of day, Pasta Madre is a cafe, a pastry-shop and a trattoria.

A note by Palano stands out in the website: a mother yeast over eighty years old. Is it possible? “Yes, because some fifteen years ago I blended two stocks of certain origin: the first from Rolando Morandin, a master from St.Vincent, a yeast passed on from father to son; the second from Teresa Busnelli, aka Pinuccia in Arluno. There can’t be any doubt”.

Ellis treats his yeast as a child, as a friend: “I even gave it a name, Rocco, because it is strong and determined. I keep it wrapped in a cloth, tied with a string, which seems very resistant, but the strength is such that because of the pressure it even got torn. And when I open it, it almost explodes. Every day I use half of it for bread and pastries; I regenerate the other half with water and flour – if the water is from the tap, in Milan it needs to be filtered, otherwise, I use mineral water. What is the secret of mother yeast? Its digestibility. Not that it’s impossible to work well with brewer’s yeast. Before moving from Friuli to Milan, I would use it but in minimal quantities while today the greatest part of those who use it, do so only to gain time. This is why today brewer’s yeast has a very bad reputation”. Especially among those who are hungry for fame.