In short. Brasciole di cavallo — called tronere in the dialect of Bari — are thin slices of horse meat rolled around pecorino, garlic and parsley and simmered slowly in tomato sauce. A dish for big occasions: working-class weddings, patron saint festivals, Sunday lunch. The dialect name says it all: in the stomach, they rumble like thunder.

Horse meat rolls: the “tronere” of Bari

A classic of the popular wedding banquets and traditional feasts of Puglia, preparing brasciole di cavallo — horse meat rolls — is a ritual in itself. In Bari they are called “tronere”.

Horse meat rolls, held closed with toothpicks, in a thick tomato sauce on a white plate

“Trònere de carcavadde”: where the name comes from. The full dialect name, trònere de carcavadde, means roughly “horse thunder”, and it describes what these rich, filling rolls do to the stomach: a dull rumble, like thunder, after a big meal. The dish has its roots in the cucina povera, the cooking of the poor: horse meat was once bought cheaply from animals that had gone lame or were too old to work. The same practical reasoning lies behind Puglia’s wider tradition of eating horse meat, tied to centuries of breeding the Murgese horse on the Murge plateau. If horse meat is unfamiliar where you live, veal works for this recipe too (see the variations below).

Ingredients

  • 500 g of thin slices of horse meat
  • 200 g of tomato sauce (passata)
  • 100 g of prosciutto fat (the white fat of cured ham)
  • extra virgin olive oil
  • 50 g of young pecorino cheese
  • garlic, onion, chilli
  • dry white wine
  • salt, parsley, basil

Method

  1. Flatten. Lay out the slices of meat and beat them thin with a meat mallet.
  2. Fill. On each slice put flakes of pecorino, chopped garlic and parsley, salt, a pinch of chilli and a little chopped prosciutto fat.
  3. Roll. Roll each slice up on itself, taking care that the filling does not escape, and close it with white kitchen string or toothpicks.
  4. Brown. In a terracotta pot, brown the rolls with chopped onion, the oil, the rest of the fat and a splash of dry white wine.
  5. Simmer. Add the tomato sauce, a touch of chilli and the shredded basil, and cook over a medium flame for a couple of hours, adding a little salted water if needed so that the sauce does not become too thick.

Notes and variations. Brasciole can also be made with veal, for a more delicate version. When they are done, the sauce — by now a proper ragù, a slow meat sauce — is perfect for dressing home-made pasta, and the best choice of all is still Apulian orecchiette.

  • Preparation: 2 hours 30 minutes
  • Difficulty: medium
  • Wine: Gioia del Colle Primitivo, the red of the Murgia — more in Primitivo and Negroamaro

For another way with horse meat, try horse meat in sauce, slowly stewed in chunks. More dishes on the second courses page and in all our Apulian recipes.