pasquinos trippa alla romana

Ingredients

1 pound honeycomb tripe, rinsed and sliced into 3” x ½ “strips (you can use flat tripe, but it won’t be as good, remember you have four stomachs to work with).
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 red onion, chopped
3 ribs celery, sliced thin
All of the best green leaves you've saved from the celery, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, peeled and “hammered” (you are allowed to use a real hammer for this but keep in mind that you are not driving nails)
1/4 cup white wine
1-2 cups cups tomato sauce, preferably homemade but we will give you the hall pass if you use a good sauce from a jar such as Rustichella D’Abruzzo, but we trust you to make your own tomato sauce
1-2 dried red peppers, or use hot red chili flakes (the use of chipotle pepper in this dish will consign you to an airlocked Vatican anteroom with Papa Ratzinger FOREVER. And after FOREVER you get Bobby Flay)
1/4 cup pecorino romano cheese
1/4 cup parmigiano cheese
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh mint leaves

Place the tripe strips in a deep pan and cover them with water. Bring to a simmer with some coarse salt and hold it there, covered, for 1 to 2 hours. Check for tenderness, but also check periodically if more H2O is needed.
Meanwhile sauté the onion, garlic and hot pepper in olive oil, just to color slightly. Add the celery and cook together for maybe 5 minutes more then hold off of heat.
When the tripe is tender add it to the pan with the other ingredients, stir and heat to medium high. Add the wine and reduce.
Add the tomato sauce to the trippa, return to simmer, cover for about ½ hour more. Taste for salt.
Combine your grated cheeses in a bowl with your chopped mint.
If the tripe is tender to your taste and the sauce is well flavored, plate it up, with a generous spoon load of cheese and mint to top it.
A note on celery leaves. The average supermarket variety tends not yield much in the way of leaves. This is a shame because they are packed with celery flavor. You can buy better celery at a farmer’s market for half the supermarket price. Celery should be dark green and bursting with chlorophyll. If you respect its flavor you will be rewarded. As a contorno serve some nice dark greens cooked as you like them. Oh, Oh, Oh if only I could get real puntarelle here to be served up with some anchovy dressing. Oh, my God.