I rang in the New Year in Provincetown with my husband and two close friends. We started the evening in a small bar. (The bartenders were from Plymouth, extra bonus.) Following drinks, we watched a first-ever drone show over Provincetown Harbor, followed by dinner at a great restaurant and then drinks back in that bar. A fun-filled night. But I was in bed by 11 and didn’t make it to midnight. Sad, I know.
The following morning my Facebook feed was flooded with the proverbial question from North Plymouth residents: Are you having squash today?
Well, that’s an interesting question. Squash on New Year’s Day has been a tradition in my family from before my birth. Both my grandmother and my mom prepared the squash days before the holiday for a special meal served only on New Year’s Day. For them it was a labor-intensive process. Squash in pasta on New Year’s Day supposedly guaranteed good luck or a healthy fortune in the coming year, a legacy from ancestral Northern Italy brought to America by so many immigrants.
Known in the community as “tootia,” the pasta and squash dish is similar to that other beloved North Plymouth staple, tortellini, known here as “tootalings.” Tootia are different from tootalings in several ways, though. First, they are filled with squash. And like the perennial debate on tootaling filling, tootia varies per family. The constant is always butternut squash but from there, the recipe is subject to many differences. Our family recipe includes butternut squash, Parmesan cheese, a little brown sugar and nutmeg.
Traditionally, the squash is prepared three days ahead. Like my mom and grandmother, I still buy a whole butternut squash or two, which is then peeled, cut into chunks and boiled in slightly salted water until it turns soft. My mom insisted the squash should sit in the water pot for a few hours after it was done cooking, a reason that is now lost to history. From the salted water the squash is placed in a Foley food mill, strained, and then allowed to drain into a tall conical colander. My mom would then allow the squash to sit for at least two days to allow it to drain as much as possible. To her, the drier the squash the better. Once fully drained, the other ingredients would be folded in (cue the Schitt’s Creek jokes here).
Pasta production began the day before Jan. 1. A simple egg and flour pasta was rolled out on a wooden board known as a tooleed. Where tootaling pasta is cut into roughly one-inch squares, tootia pasta is generally cut into at least two-inch squares, then given a healthy dollop of the squash filling, folded across the diagonal, and – like the tootaling – twisted into the familiar belly button shape. A few hours of air drying followed.
The same day the pasta was made, the sauce was put together. And of course, North Plymouth Bolognese sauces vary from family to family. Our recipe is fairly simple: ground beef, ground pork, celery, onion, crushed tomatoes. . . and hours of cooking and simmering. Those are the ingredients found on Italian family farms more than a century ago.
On the morning of New Year’s Day, my paternal grandmother faithfully followed a peculiar superstition. Before she left the house she had to be greeted by a male family member not living in her home. This job usually fell to my brother or me since we lived next door. I don’t ever recall my father doing this. We had this job well into our twenties. The trip was always rewarded with a dollar – and it was still a dollar when I became an adult.
My paternal grandmother lived well into her eighties and was there to celebrate the birth of several great grandchildren (my daughter’s being the last one she witnessed). She made some of my favorite meals and her tootia was among them.
Finally, on New Year’s Day, after a quick boiling, the tootia was smothered with the Bolognese sauce. As a kid I couldn’t eat enough of them (still true), but the irony is that I detest butternut squash on its own. I won’t eat it at Thanksgiving or as a side dish on any occasion. Even when I make it myself, I have someone else taste the filling before I fill the shells. And yes, shells. I now buy the jumbo pasta shells (which are getting harder to find).
I’m not the only one who has gone down the shell avenue. A quick survey of Facebook discussions shows that most of my generation now use the shells or create a lasagna with layers of noodles, squash, and sauce. Some have resorted to buying premade squash raviolis.
Still, regardless of how we prepare it, it remains a strong tradition among generations of North Plymouth residents. This year, we enjoyed our tootia on Saturday after the New Year because it was the only day we could get my family together to enjoy the meal. There were no leftovers! (But by waiting a couple of days, did we lose out on the promise of good luck for the year? Only time will tell.)
As we head into 2026 I wish you Bon Ca Dan, the butchered Americanized Bolognese Italian dialect version of Buon Capodanno (Good New Year’s Day). In any event, I’m looking forward to bringing you some great stories of Plymouth’s history and architecture.
Architect Bill Fornaciari is a lifelong resident of Plymouth (except for a three-year adventure going West as a young man) and is the owner of BF Architects in Plymouth. His firm specializes in residential work and historic preservation. Have a question or idea for this column? Email Bill at billfornaciari@gmail.com.