03 · The shop

One Bench, Four People, Since 2012

A narrow former bakery in Trieste, a marble bench, and a morning that starts at half past five.

The Bakery That Became a Pasta Shop

Nives opened Rvoelly in 2012 in a narrow former bakery, with one marble bench, a hand-cranked roller and three shapes on the counter: tagliatelle, ravioli and cjarsons. The oven went long ago, but the tiles behind the counter are the baker’s, and the hooks that held the bread baskets now hold the cutters.

Ilenia, Dario and Sanja came one at a time as the counter grew. Ilenia runs the filled shapes, Dario rolls the doughs and rides the Friday bike, and Sanja keeps the counter and the order book and pinches cjarsons faster than any of us. Today there are four of us at the bench from half past five, and the cjarsons filling is still the one from Nives’s grandmother’s village in Carnia.

The roller from the first day, still clamped to the bench

05:30 to 13:30

The Morning

05:30

Doughs mixed and left to rest under cloths.
06:30

Sheets rolled to 0.8 mm, one after another.
07:30

Tagliatelle, tagliolini and pappardelle cut and nested.
08:00

Door open. The first trays are on the counter.
09:00

Same-day email orders weighed and wrapped.
10:00

Cjarsons on the counter, Thursday to Saturday.
11:00

The second batch of ravioli comes out of the back.
12:30

The trays thin out. What is left is what there is.
13:30

Bench scrubbed, radio off, coffee.

Flour, Eggs and Paper

The 00 flour and the re-milled durum come from a mill in the region, a short drive away. The eggs come from a farm on the Karst plateau above the town, collected twice a week, and the colour of the tagliatelle is the colour of the yolks. Nothing is added to make it yellower.

Everything leaves wrapped in paper, not plastic. Fresh pasta keeps breathing; in a sealed box it sweats, the flour turns to paste and the nests stick together. In paper it keeps 3 days in the fridge.