A dry-cured pork sausage, generously tinged and spiced with Calabrian red chili, aged for weeks. Piquant, fermented, salty: a mouthful of Calabria that keeps and slips into any pack.

Why this dish? The Army of the Holy Faith was Calabrian to the bone, and soppressata is THE salumi of Calabria: a dry salami, red with chili, that travels in a knapsack without spoiling. Feeding a marching troop through the mountains meant first counting on these peasant cured meats — the very signature of the terroir that gave the cardinal his soldiers.

My Calabrians never set out on campaign without one of these red sausages hanging from their belt. We mix pork with that fiery chili of their mountains, press it, let it dry in the wind off the rocks for weeks, and there it is, ready to last as long as needed. A slice on a hunk of bread, and the man is satisfied and his blood warmed. Believe me: you don't raise an army of mountaineers without knowing what feeds their courage — and that chili, I think, is its secret.

How it was made : Pork, slaughtered in winter, was entirely transformed into cured meats to last the year (the famous 'pork cuisine'). In Calabria, chili — massively adopted after its arrival from the New World — served both as seasoning and preservative. Soppressata, 'nduja, and capocollo formed the protein reserve of peasant families and men on the move.

The contemporary twist : Presented in thin translucent slices on a slate board with Calabrian chestnut honey, the spicy soppressata becomes a very contemporary sweet-spicy aperitif board.

Cardinal Ruffo · Charactorium