No one can fault a popular food company for not wanting to share the secret to their success. Especially if a pinch of this spice or tablespoon of that seasoning is what’s brought customers to its door for generations. So really, can you blame Stella Ricci for fudging the ingredient list when her son applied to the U.S. Department of Agriculture so they could sell their hot and sweet Italian sausage to restaurants, bars and pizza houses? In 1972, Ernest Ricci Jr. was looking to grow Ricci’s Italian Sausage, the retail sausage company his father, Ernest Sr., started in 1945 in McKees Rocks, with a wholesale division. To get the official stamp of approval, ingredients must be listed in descending order by weight on the label, which meant the family’s secret mix of pork, paprika and various spices would be disclosed. Stella, however, wasn’t buying it. “She was like, ‘Do you really think I gave them the real recipe?’” third-generation owner Ernie Ricci III — then still in his teens — r...