Buon appetito: Ross woman wins recipe contest for pasta dish

You have to respect the ingredients — that’s the philosophy of Nina Mule Lyons when she steps into the kitchen to create an authentic Italian meal.

One of those meals won the Parmigiano Reggiano Masterpiece Recipe Contest last year and earned the Ross resident a trip to dine in New York City.

“When I saw the contest on social media, I thought, ‘I can do this,’” said Lyons, 68. “So I got to work. It took two days to come up with a recipe. I made it, took a photo and sent it by email.”

The contest was celebrating Parmigiano Reggiano Day, which is Oct. 27. People were invited to share their favorite recipes across four categories for a chance to win an exclusive dinner prepared by U.S. brand ambassador Chef Michele Casadei Massari.

The winners in each category were selected by a panel of chefs from varied backgrounds.

Lyons’ dish was passatelli haluski. She combined the idea of passatelli, a pasta made of bread crumbs, eggs, grated Parmesan cheese, which she discovered in Bologna, Italy, with haluski — a dish with cabbage, onions and noodles, that is also known as Polish pasta.

Judge and chef Edvina Sarukhanyan said he liked that Lyons took elements from Italian and Polish cuisine to create an easy-to-make dish that combines the flavors of each culture.

Lyons learned the art of pasta making from her mother, Josephine Randazzo Mule, who only used the freshest ingredients. Lyons’ mother had no formal chef training but worked in Pittsburgh restaurants Minutello’s and Natoli’s.

For the winning dish ingredients, Lyons drove directly to Pennsylvania Macaroni in the Strip District.

“I use the Mutti tomato brand that they sell at Penn Mac because you need the best products to make the tastiest dishes,” said Lyons. “When I went to Penn Mac, I asked them for the best piece of Parmigiano Reggiano. Using quality ingredients becomes part of your culture.”

That culture was cultivated through her family that valued Italian traditions, eating simple food made with fresh and authentic ingredients in recipes passed down from one generation to the next, she said.

Courtesy of Nina Mule Lyons

Nina Mulè Lyons in her mom’s kitchen when she was about 10 years old.

She learned to cook by helping her mom in the kitchen, starting “as soon as she could reach the stove,” she said.

Lyons traces her ancestry to Altavilla Milicia, a small village in Sicily, the Italian island just off the “toe” of Italy’s “boot.”

Lyons never worked in a restaurant but she has appeared on WQED-TV with Chris Fennimore. Some of her recipes are in his cook books. She sent recipes to him and he called and told her, “you cook like my Sicilian Grandmother,” she said.

There are times she gets stopped in grocery stores with people who say they saw her on TV – “help me pick an eggplant,” they have asked her.

In 2018 and 2019 Lyons spent time in Italy studying mosaics in Ravenna, a city in the Emilia Romagna region. She spent time in Bologna, the capital of Emilia Romagna, which is where she said she fell in love with Parmigiano Reggiano.

The man running the contest, Federico Bolla, called Lyons to ask her why she decided to incorporate the haluski as one of the ingredients in the winning recipe.

“I am from Pittsburgh and haluski is something people eat in Pittsburgh,” she said. “He said, ‘I love it. It’s delicious.’

“So, as an Italian girl living in Pittsburgh I had no choice but to make a dish that included both the Italian and Polish cultures,” she said. “The star of the recipe is Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, because it gives the dish its distinctive taste and rich aroma. “

Massari said he loves a good “passatelli in brodo” or “passatelli soup” – which is Bologna’s signature dish.

He is constantly exploring ways to elevate the eating experience by using Parmigiano-Reggiano in diverse cuisines.

“I applaud Nina for introducing a clever and simple twist on a Polish recipe, blending innovation with tradition and bringing two cultures together,” said Massari, in a statement. “I love how she used Parmigiano-Reggiano with the other ingredients, in a dish that crosses boundaries and explores new territories.”

Her husband Joseph Patrick Lyons has been calling his wife “The Big Cheese.” They don’t have children so this was a way to share the recipe with the next generation, she said, so it will live on.

“I am always looking for ways to help keep the legacy of these recipes alive,” she said. “I never expected to win and end up in New York City. All I can say is wow!”

She and her husband had dinner at Lucciola, which means firefly in Italian, on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. She had Parmigiano-Reggiano cheesecake for dessert and Wagu beef and deconstructed lasagna, which is a pasta dish that is not in layers. She won the trip last year but asked if she could travel to New York this summer.

“It was a small restaurant with the most delicious food,” she said. “You could tell they use the freshest ingredients.”