Our Authentic Neapolitan Ragù Cooking Class in Tuscany is designed to be flexible and unique. We are fully itinerant, which means we can bring the experience directly to your private villa or holiday home anywhere in Tuscany. If you prefer, you can also join us in our welcoming kitchen near Lucca, at Dolce Vita in Tuscany, for the same hands-on class surrounded by the charm of the Tuscan countryside.

If you’ve ever dreamed of learning how to make Italy’s most iconic slow-cooked sauce, our Authentic Neapolitan Ragù Cooking Class in Tuscany is the perfect culinary experience. During this hands-on class, you’ll discover the secrets of preparing ragù with meat rolls (braciole), simmered for hours until rich and flavorful. This traditional recipe, passed down through generations, is the centerpiece of Italian Sunday family meals—and it was personally taught to me by my dear friend Angela, who is of Neapolitan origins. Angela and I often exchange recipes and cooking tips, and this ragù has become one of my most treasured dishes to share.

What Makes a Neapolitan Ragù Cooking Class in Tuscany So Special?

Unlike a quick tomato sauce, Neapolitan ragù is all about time and patience. The meats—beef rolls, pork ribs, Tuscan sausages, and pork neck—slowly release their flavors into the sauce, creating layers of depth. The braciole, stuffed with cheese, garlic, and parsley, are the soul of the dish.

Braciole Preparation

Cooking Ragù in Our Tuscan Kitchen

In our cooking class, you’ll prepare the ragù step by step:

• Filling the beef slices with a tasty Parmesan mixture to roll them into braciole
• Searing the meats to lock in flavor
• Deglazing with red wine
• Simmering tomato passata until the sauce thickens
• Adding beef braciole for the final touch

By the end of the class, you’ll have created a dish that pairs beautifully with Pici, rigatoni, paccheri, or fresh handmade pasta.

You can also explore our Tuscan pasta-making class to see how perfectly ragù pairs with fresh homemade pasta.

Why Learn Neapolitan Ragù in Tuscany?

Learning how to cook ragù in Tuscany offers a unique experience, blending Neapolitan tradition with local Tuscan ingredients and hospitality. You’ll not only cook but also enjoy the meal together—just as Italians do on Sundays.

pork ribs and sauce

For more about the history of ragù and braciole, check out this guide to Neapolitan cuisine.

Join Our Authentic Neapolitan Ragù Cooking Class in Tuscany

Whether you’re a passionate foodie or simply curious about Italian traditions, this class will transport you into the heart of Italian family kitchens. You’ll return home not just with recipes but with a story to share.

authentic Sausage meatballs

Neapolitan Ragù with Meat Rolls (Braciole)

Ingredients

• Extra virgin olive oil

• 1 large quantity of finely chopped onions

• Salt

• 1 glass of red wine

• 1 bottle of tomato passata (strained tomatoes)

• Ground black pepper to taste

• Grana Padano cheese, grated

• Pecorino cheese, grated

• Fresh parsley, finely chopped

• Garlic, finely chopped

Meats:

• Beef slices (thinly sliced, for rolls)

• Pork scamerita (pork neck)

• Rostinciana (Tuscan-style pork ribs)

• Tuscan sausages

Instructions

Prepare the meat rolls (braciole):

Grate the Grana Padano and Pecorino cheeses and finely chop the parsley and garlic.
On each beef slice, place a small amount of grated cheeses, chopped parsley, and garlic. Roll the slices into small rolls (like skewers or involtini) and secure with toothpicks.

Sear the meats:

In a large heavy-bottomed pot, heat some extra virgin olive oil. Add a generous amount of finely chopped onions and a bit of salt. Let the onions soften gently.
Then add the pork scamerita, rostinciana, and Tuscan sausages, browning them on all sides.

Deglaze with wine:

Pour in the red wine and let it simmer for a few minutes to evaporate the alcohol, stirring occasionally.

Add tomato passata:

Pour in the tomato passata. Season with salt and black pepper to taste. Let the sauce simmer gently over low heat for at least 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

Add the beef rolls:

Add the prepared beef rolls (braciole) to the sauce and continue cooking gently for another couple of hours, until the sauce is thick and flavorful and the meats are tender.

Finish with cheese and parsley:

Once the ragù is ready, stir in some grated Grana Padano, Pecorino, and a bit of freshly chopped parsley. Mix well to let the cheese melt into the sauce.

To Serve:

This rich Neapolitan ragù is perfect with rigatoni, paccheri, or as a filling for lasagna. The beef rolls can be served on top of the pasta or on the side as a succulent second course.

Buon appetito!

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For your homemade pasta

INGREDIENTS 4 people:

PROCEDURE:

Salva

Salva

L'articolo The Real Italian Meat Sauce (Ragu) proviene da Cooking Classes and Private Chef In Tuscany.

Cooking classes all year round!    It’s autumn and our cooking classes in Tuscany don’t stop. When preparing dishes with fresh and seasonal ingredients, you can cook all year round without any problems.

Our menus change, our culinary proposals change. But if you want to take a cooking course you have 2 possibilities:
1) WE come to wherever you’re staying in Tuscany.
2) YOU come to our Dolce Vita in Tuscany, brick’n mortar cooking school near Lucca

During Autumn and Wintertime, I often run cooking classes that have porcini as protagonists. It has been like this for many years. After 3 hours of class, we’re very happy to serve you at the table, while enjoying the fruits of your labor. Sipping a nice glass of Tuscan wine, of course.
Cheers then!
And here is the recipe

L'articolo cooking classes all year round: porcini mushrooms and spaghetti! proviene da Cooking Classes and Private Chef In Tuscany.

By popular demand, here’s our last: HANDMADE ORECCHIETTE LIVE ON STREAM CLASS. I run these FREE LIVE ON STREAM CLASSES directly from My Cooking School near Lucca, in Tuscany.

You’ll learn how to make the dough, how to shape orecchiette…and in addiction: an amazing pasta sauce.

The typical sauce for Orecchiette: Broccoli Sauce!

It comes directly from Puglia (South Italy) and by watching the video, you’ll also learn a precious tip to make this sauce to ist best.

Just a suggestion: before watching buy these ingredients, so you can make this with me directly. Furthermore don’t forget that I jump on the HANDMADE ORECCHIETTE LIVE ON STREAM CLASS, even when the broadcast is done. That’s why I can ask all your questions, always.

Buon Appetito and enjoy this Free HANDMADE ORECCHIETTE LIVE ON STREAM CLASS for you!

INGREDIENTS (2 people):

200gr; 1 cup: Semolina Flour

100gr; 1/2 cup: water

to taste salt

1 tbsp extra virgin oil

THE SAUCE:

500gr, 1 pound: Broccoli

1 garlic clove

4 anchovy fillets

1 fresh red chili pepper (or some flakes)

4 tbsp extra virgin oil

2 tbsp Parmigiano Reggiano or Grana Padano Cheese

TOOLS:

Dough cutter

1 Knife with a rounded tip (dinner knife): IMPORTANT

Pot for water

Spider strainer

Pan

I hope to meet you one day here in this magic place: the DOLCE VITA B&B and APARTMENT

Interesting Recipes with Broccoli: Penne ai Broccoli and Sun-dried Tomatoes, Broccoli, Shrimps and Turmeric, broccoli and veggies pies

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Live on stream cooking class directly from my Cooking School near Lucca, Tuscany.

Today’s dish: fresh handmade bow ties! And colored, yes, in fact, they’re pink this time…just add some tomato paste and it’s done.

During our Cooking Classes in Tuscany, we make many types of pasta and the colored one is one of the most successful

Do you feel like fresh pasta? This doesn’t need the machine!

  PINK BOW-TIE Fresh handmade pasta LIVE ON STREAM COOKING CLASS    with delicious Shrimps and zucchini sauce!

INGREDIENTS  (2 people):

200 gr; (1 cup; 2 disposable glasses) Semolina Flour

2 tbsp tomato paste

3 zucchini (large) OR 6 small zucchini

200 gr; 7,2 oz shelled shrimps

1 leak

3 tbsp, extra virgin oil

1/2 glass white wine

to taste black pepper

to taste salt

1 sprig of fresh oregano, fresh peppermint, basil leaves (optional)

TOOLS:

Rolling pin

Dough cutter

Festooned cutter wheel

Smooth cutter wheel OR a simple smooth knife

small bowl with water

bowls

spoon

Large knife to cut veggies

Immersion blender and its glass OR a simple blender

Spider strainer

Pan

METHOD:

Make fresh handmade pasta dough with semolina flour, water, and tomato paste.

Make a stripe, then many rectangles (1,6 x 1, 4 inches)

Shape the bow-ties (at min 30,45 VIDEO)

Cook them in boiling salted water for about 3 minutes

Season with your fav sauce. Here in the video, I’m making a delicious zucchini and shrimps sauce.

Fresh Handmade Pasta Live on stream cooking class

Other kinds of fresh colored pasta HERE!

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Calling a Chef at your Villa in Tuscany means making you taste the true flavors of local cuisine.

When I started my job as a private chef and cookery teacher, I never imagined that the working season would last so long. I thought I would have worked at most 3 months.

Instead, the tourists who visit Tuscany are more and more and they love to stay here longer and longer.

The first time maybe 3 or 4 days, then a week, a month. And then there are those who want to transfer here and with some sacrifice can do it too.

One of the most authentic experiences you can have in Tuscany is the Cooking Course of Edible Plants.

We go for a walk, we gather wild but edible plants and then we cook them in a house immersed in the nature of the Tuscan hills.

And it is thanks to the working season, which is getting longer and longer, that in recent years this course is having great success.

There are no longer only Summer tourists, that is vacationers. Nowadays many people love to travel in Spring or Autumn, especially those who are looking for good food.

In these seasons the fruits of the earth are in fact more generous and varied; the colors of Tuscany are indescribable and country walks seem like real movie sets.

Furthermore, edible plants provide a lot of benefits.

Well, with this spirit, the other day I went with my daughter Ginevra to take a walk on the hill. We found some splendid wild fennel and decided to propose it to Swedish tourists from Stockholm, for whom I would cook the next day as “Chef at your Villa in Tuscany”.

Calling a Chef at your Villa in Tuscany means eating according to the seasons, everything is fresh and we prepare the whole meal from scratch, on the spot.

Traveling out of season, for example in Autumn, can reserve you some wonderful surprises, here in Tuscany.

In the case of fennel, in addition to the leaves, you can also collect the seeds. Well with these you can make fantastic biscuits cantuccini. Yes, just using fennel seeds instead of anise!

If you call me in Autumn, I will be happy to prepare you not only fresh Pasta but Risottos with the most succulent veggies you have ever tasted; and let’s not talk about the main courses.

In fact, it is precisely in this season that they are most appreciated.

Well, here’s finally the recipe for you: very fast, faster than you can imagine.

Tools that you need:

• a Santoku knife or a Mezzaluna

L'articolo Chef at your Villa in Tuscany: Wild Fennel Spaghetti proviene da Cooking Classes and Private Chef In Tuscany.

10 years ago I chose to be a teacher of Private Cooking Classes and a Chef for Vacation, thanks to the places I live. I founded my company “Cuoche in Vacanza” and for the most part, I choose my suppliers among the farmers.

My great fortune is to live in the countryside between Pisa and Lucca, a land rich in cultivated fields, vegetable gardens, and woods.

Franca, my trusted supplier

Here’s Franca, only seasonal veggies in Tuscany!

Franca is a peasant woman who set up a fruit and vegetable shop at the bottom of her husband’s fields. Imagining the taste of Franca’s vegetables is impossible.

Do you know why? She and her husband collect the vegetables when they are still small and tender. Once the plant dies they plant another veg.

The black Tuscan kale is typical of Tuscany; it is a symbol of this rough and tasty land, like the farmers who live there.

Think that my granny Amossina, when she left the countryside to live in Pisa, she cultivated Tuscan kale on the terrace.

Tuscan Kale

You know, there are many recipes with black cabbage, from croutons of bread and garlic to the bordatino soup. Yet the recipe I am about to write to you was unknown to me, until a few days ago. It is a simple and fresh sauce because it is made with raw kale!

Now you must know that the Tuscan kale is very leathery once it is grown. Precisely for this reason, it is cooked for a long time, even if slowly.

And here Franca told me about the recipe for fresh Tuscan kale pesto.

Well, if the pesto of Tuscan kale is still a delicious sauce for pasta if you make it with the leaves still small then … it’s amazing!

Do you know the classic Pesto, the one with basil? Well, the procedure is the same, but here it is Tuscan kale.

Franca and her husband veggie shop, at the end of their fields

I’m a chef for vacation and a new season of work will start soon. Spring is coming and unfortunately, here the Tuscan kale loves cold weather. I’m saying unfortunately because it is almost impossible to find it in Summer, for my cooking classes or private dinners in Tuscany.

So I decided to grow it in my small vegetable garden, at my Cooking School and bed and breakfast Dolce Vita in Tuscany, in the Lucca countryside. Getting my customers to taste the typically Tuscan ingredients and dishes is a must for me.

And so, as a chef for Vacation, the Tuscan kale will not fail from our course menus and dinners.

Tips :

• if you do not have the Tuscan kale in small leaves, remove the leathery parts, such as the central green stem.
• Toast the pine nuts in a pan and let them cool. Always toast dried nuts! 
• Unlike the classic pesto, in this case, you can add chili. It is great!
• Don’t forget that this is still a Pesto, add Parmesan and pecorino Romano Cheese if you want it gorgeous!
• While using the blender, always incorporate the oil flush from the top so that it takes as much air as possible. This causes the pesto to become more and more creamy. 
  

  my fav pasta for fresh kale pesto: rigatoni

   

Well, this is my favorite kind of dried pasta for Tuscan kale pesto: Rigatoni 

Furthermore, this is my fav dried pasta Brand: Rummo

Do you know another vegetable with which to make a fresh pesto? Please inform me, I’m always looking for new recipes.

Tuscan Kale Pesto

L'articolo Chef for Vacation in Tuscany: kale pesto recipe from my veggie supplier! proviene da Cooking Classes and Private Chef In Tuscany.

Gourmet holidays in Tuscany?  Finally, it is possible, but with a new model. In fact, you will not have to look for many different schools or spending lots of money on restaurants which call improvised chefs just for tourist reasons.

Personally, I’m a Professional Chef (Certificate Accademia Italiana in Florence 100/100), a Sommelier (Certificate FISAR, Federazione Italiana Sommeliers Albergatori e Ristoratori), and a manager in Tuscany for Slow Food Association (Good, Clean and Fair food).

Why Gourmet holidays

It is not just a question of titles, it is proof that we are serious about cooking. Respecting the simplicity of the ingredients that this land offers you and the succession of the seasons.

So, whether you’d like an introduction to the real Tuscan and Italian kitchen or a deepening on particular dishes, with Cuoche in Vacanza (Italian for Chefs for your Vacation) you can find an honest answer.

Who more than one Professional Chef can offer you splendid gourmet holidays?

If you like fine eating, if you are a gourmet, this blog is for you.

Furthermore, if you happen to come on vacation here in Tuscany well, know that we await you with open arms. Fill this contact form and we’ll keep in touch!

We are a Traveling Cooking School specialized in Italian Cuisine.

Since we’re itinerants, we offer 2 types of private services at your villa:

Cooking Classes

Private Dinners

We do the shopping and come directly to your holiday home, wherever you are staying in Tuscany.

So these are gourmet holidays, are not they?

If you’re in Tuscany on vacation, just call us, because we can make together all the dishes that you find on this blog. Just like today’s recipe, Paccheri!

What’s Paccheri Pasta?

Paccheri is a type of traditional Neapolitan pasta of cylindrical shape, smooth or striped, very similar to rigatoni but larger.

The name “paccheri”, in the Italian tradition, recalls the “pacca”, a friendly slap given open-handed to greet or congratulate someone. The term derives from the Greek, “pas” which means everything, and “keir” which means hand, therefore literally “the whole hand”, “full hand”.

That’s why in Naples paccheri are also called “schiaffoni” (Italian for big slaps)

Furthermore, try to hear the noise they make when you throw them on the plate: it seems just the sound of many slaps!

(Free translated from Mulino Vald’Orcia)

What you can find on this Blog?

Anyway, if you’re living abroad, far away from Italy, no problem. In fact here on this blog, you can find all the recipes that we make with our students in cooking classes or customers in private dinners in the villa.

Furthermore, you will be amazed at the ease of preparing them. In fact, I personally check all the steps so that everyone can easily (and often quickly) replicate a recipe. 

Well, with pasta Paccheri (today recipe) you’re going to make something special. This kind of pasta lends itself very well to well-served plates.

In a few words, you’re going to make a very good impression with your family and friends!

General suggestion:

Remember that you do not need many ingredients to make a good dish, but you need top-quality ingredients.

So, do you have tomatoes that are not good? Do not put them on

Too sour tomatoes? Make them confit, caramelize them in a pan with a spoonful of brown sugar.

This is important: squid must be fresh, just like the ones we offer you during your gourmet holidays in Tuscany.

In the kitchen, you can use many frozen things, no problem, but squid no  They are tasteless and moreover, they become gummy … in a nutshell, you spoil a gourmet dish.

Finally here’s this gourmet recipe!

OTHER DELICIOUS FIRST PASTA COURSES

Florence cooking class: puttanesca pasta sauce at your vacation home!

Montespertoli: holiday home cooking classes with asparagus and courgette flowers Sauce for Gnocchi

#Family Cooking Classes:The Best Meatballs Sauce for Spaghetti to remember your Holidays in Tuscany!

If you don’t live in Italy, you can buy Paccheri pasta  HERE

L'articolo Gourmet holidays in Tuscany: dinner with pasta paccheri! proviene da Cooking Classes and Private Chef In Tuscany.

Fresh filled pasta cooking class: Agnolotti del plin: 

this is a famous dish of Piemonte region, very popular in Italy.

A bit of history

This dish boasts ancient origins, in fact, we find “agnolotti” in a recipe of 1846, from a Chef living in Turin.

In the past they served the agnolotti “inside a napkin”: once cooked and drained. So that they did not lose softness. They consumed agnolotti without seasoning, to enhance the taste of the filling. Only sometimes they served them with a light broth, separately in a cup, or with red wine.

The name agnolotti

seems to derive from a term of the Piedmontese dialect “anulòt”, indicating a ring-shaped tool used to prepare homemade agnolotti. In fact, once this traditional egg pasta was round and only later took the typical shape.

It is, in fact, the characteristic closure at the origin of the name. Although each family has its own interpretation of the filling, the closure is always the same: the shape is rectangular and you’ve to make a small pinch; that’s exactly the famous PLIN!

How to prepare Agnolotti

It is a rather laborious preparation because it includes processing also for the filling. In fact, once cooked, you’ve to wait some minutes for the filling to cool, then you’ll chop it.

Anyway, it’ll be one of the most delicious Italian fresh filled kinds of pasta that you are going to taste.

Since it’s really appreciated fresh pasta, it’s requested in our cookery courses and when someone calls me for private chef service.

So, if you’re lucky enough to come to Tuscany,

maybe on Summer vacations, you can call me to teach you how to prepare Agnolotti del plin. My company is Cuoche in Vacanza (Italian for Chefs for your vacation) and we come directly to your holiday home to run private cooking classes or dinners. 

Well, a fresh filled pasta cooking class is often requested, and I can assure you that you’ll be able to replicate delicious pasta dishes once came back to your country.

The VIDEO below explains very well how to fold and shape agnolotti del plin!

Important Tips

The dough is then prepared, placing the flour in a fountain on a pastry board and adding the eggs.

You can find the RECIPE for fresh pasta by clicking HERE.

Once spread in a thin sheet, proceed to shape the “Plin”, preventing the dough to harden.

Well, now form small stuffing hazelnuts with the fingers and place them on the dough sheet about one centimeter from the edge and at the distance of 1 centimeter from each other. Fold the edge of the sheet on the row of small piles of filling and make it adhere longitudinally, with a slight pressure of the fingers. Therefore, cut the row of Plin with a pasta wheel.

Then cut the dough into a pinch (this is the PLIN), to weld the filling. With the wheel, separate the small “agnolotti” one from the other and leave them to rest for a couple of hours, so that they dry slightly.

A fresh filled pasta cooking class, furthermore for agnolotti, need a lot of time. Who calls me for this, is really motivated to learn something complex.

What about the Sugo d’Arrosto Sauce?

Sugo d’arrosto (Italian for gravy roasted sauce) is the name the here in Italy we give to a wonderful, delicious sauce that you can make with the meat from the filling of agnolotti.

Furthermore, you can use this exquisite sauce to season the agnolotti. That’s why I often cook more meat and make more filling. In fact, you’ve just to take the stuffing (parmesan excluded) already minced and add some broth (max 2 or 3 tbsp) to this. You can also add 1 tbsp of extra virgin oil if you like. You’ll obtain a light-colored sauce.

Well, season the agnolotti with this gravy and be ready to taste one of the most delicious Italian gravy.

Curiosity

Depending on the area, the filling may have some variations; in the Langhe and Monferrato, for example, in addition to veal and pork, the rabbit is added and they put also cabbage or escarole. This is exactly what I usually do…I love the sauce with the 3 kinds of meat.

Perfect Sauces for Agnolotti (apart from Sugo d’Arrosto of course)

The Original Ragu Meat Sauce

Butter and Crispy Sage Sauce

Save and Print the recipe!

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Florence cooking class, Pisa cooking class, or Lucca cooking class? Of course!

We come to wherever you’re staying in Tuscany to prepare the tastiest dishes with you.

Or alternatively, you can come to our Dolce Vita Cooking School and bed and breakfast in the Lucca countryside, the:

Furthermore, since fresh pasta is what we love above all else, you can be sure that you’re having fresh handmade pasta before your eyes.

Well, you know that if we talk about pasta, we talk about an amazing sauce to pair with. Tell you the truth this is not difficult, because here in Italy you can find ONLY amazing pasta sauces; or this is what I believe, don’t you?

So for sure, can’t forget a Florence cooking class where my students and gourmet customers learned making the famous Caramelized Tomatoes Sauce. How could I? It was on the rooftops of Florence! 

You can also indulge with Amatriciana, Carbonara, Cacio e Pepe: the traditional Italian Pasta Sauces.

You can have a look at the recipes that I wrote but also call us to come to your home vacation for a cooking class. Why not, a private dinner as well?

Whatever you’re going to do, I’m sure that you’ll obtain delicious dishes…you’re in good hands!

Each year is different

My job as Cooking Classes Coach and Private Chef is a seasonal one: we start in April and finish in November. Each year is different from another and I love that we need to renew our menus.

Last year we had a lot of requests for Pasta and Tuscan Truffle, this Summer everyone ask for Puttanesca (recipe below) that’s absolutely one of my fav pasta sauces.

We made it during our last Florence cooking class, with a family of 8 people. They were very impressed by this tasteful and delicate at the same time, sauce. One of them didn’t like anchovies and didn’t want to taste the Puttanesca sauce.

But he did it and I can’t forget his smile while he told me that the sauce was astonishing, furthermore, he almost didn’t feel the anchovies flavor.

In fact, my friends, this is a characteristic of Puttanesca: all ingredients perfectly mix up together to make an exquisite sauce.

Florence Cooking Class: Puttanesca History

While running a cooking class in Tuscany, we often explain the story (not only the recipe) of a dish. Well, with Puttanesca one always laughs because of the meaning of its name. Puttanesca is the Italian word for something concerning prostitutes. “Puttana” is an Italian bad word to call a prostitute.

The origin of the name has many interpretations. Someone talks about the owner of a house of appointments in the Spanish Quarter in Naples, which usually refreshed his guests with this dish, taking advantage of the speed and ease of preparation.

A different interpretation is given to us by Jeanne Carola Francesconi in her book “La Cucina Napoletana”.

In fact, everyone called this sauce for “macaroni” with the name of  “marinara”.

[…] After the Second World War, in Ischia, the painter Eduardo Colucci, I do not know why or why renamed them with the name with which today is generally known.

heather-schwartz-493944-unsplash

Pasta types

This is one of those sauces that you can pair with all kinds of pasta:

short pasta like penne or rigatoni, long pasta like spaghetti, fresh egg pasta as well.

L'articolo Florence cooking class: puttanesca pasta sauce at your vacation home! proviene da Cooking Classes and Private Chef In Tuscany.