Il Bollito Misto or Italian Boiled Dinner: What's On the Plate?

Il Bollito Misto, Or Italian Boiled Dinner: Cotechino

Cotechino is a gelatinous pork sausage made with a mixture of meat and pork rinds, which provide the texture (and the name, from cotiche). It supposedly was invented by the Modenesi when Pope Giulio II, the warrior Pope, besieged them after they tried to form an alliance with Venice.

Considering that Giulio won, cotechino and its cousin, the zampone (a pig's trotter stuffed with the same mixture were the only good things to come of the war for the Modenesi.

Now Cotechino is one of the standard foods enjoyed on New year's day, perhaps because it goes very well with the lentils that augur good luck, and is also a requirement in a good bollito misto.