ceceliauna

Glad to be of help.

Any recommendations for unique recipe books for Italian cuisine?

franco

ek is our primary cookbook expert... ek, where are you? You're being missed, not just because your advice on cookbooks is being needed!!! If you're asking me, cecelia, I'd say cookbooks of "Italian" cuisine are mostly fictional - there is hardly such a thing as Italian cuisine (singular), just regional Italian cuisines. Marcella Hazan's two large volumes are the best examples I know (but I repeat, I'm not a cookbook expert) on all-Italian cuisine (that is, she's assembling recipes from more or less all Italian regions, and she's normally telling where they are from). My personal favourites, though, are regional books, such as:
- Ricette di Osterie e di Porti Marchigiani (a Slow Food edition)
- Cucina d'Abruzzo (Casa Editrice Tinari)
- La Cucina Ligure by Alessandro Molinari Pradelli (Newton & Compton Editori)
- Mantova a tavola ogni giorno dell'anno (written and edited by Giancarlo Malagutti)
- Original venezianische Küche by Cornelia Schinharl (Seehamer Verlag)
- La Cucina Umbra (written & edited by Carlo Grassetti)

tomassocroccante

Franco -
I was ready for you to list "Il Cucchiaio d'Argento", just published for the first time in English last year - THE SILVER SPOON her in the US.
They say this is the Italian home kitchen cookbook since 1950. What do YOU say?

franco

I say let's wait for ek to come back, since I don't simply know that book, I'm so sorry - she's our cookbook maven, NOT me. The second expert would be Eloise, who unfortunately seems to have broken the friendship with us.

tomassocroccante

The friend whose cooking I enjoy the most, if not the most often, also very much likes Lydia Bastianich' s book(s). AND he likes to check recipe reviews at epicurious.com - the forums there are filled with helpful comments such as "So-and-so's recipe for vitello tonnato will turn to mush unless you cut the cooking time in half" etc.

koreaprincess

Hi everyone! I am now in New York getting ready to fly to Naples tomorrow night. I had to check in and put in my "2 cents" re cookbooks. When I taught cooking in LA, I had the pleasure of meeting Marcella Hazan, whose cookbooks I thoroughly enjoy, as well as Giuliano Bugialli. He has a wonderful cookbook which covers all the regions of Italy, which of course I have in storage since I moved to Korea! Franco, I must tell you that re pasta, DeCecco is my 2nd favorite, but tonight I fixed a simple DeCecco orrichiete dish with olive oil, pepperoncini, tiny asparagus and sage, which was enjoyed by all. If I had had some porcini mushrooms it would have been superb. Soon it will be pajata time! arriverderci, the princess

cigalechanta

tomass., before I go to theland of nod, I wanted to tell you that I have been a fan of MFK Fisher for many years and unknowingly followed in many of her footsteps. In my cookbook collection, I have her 1968 "Cooking of Provincal France" with a forward by Julia Childs.
This was part odf a series on cooking put out by Time-Life.
It's not vry good but it's history of a writer I considered a modern day Colette.
Bon Soir.
mimi

tomassocroccante

Yeah, Mimi, MFKF was quite a writer. People who have read it will never forget her story about the hike that included lunch as the only customer at a restaurant, where she was served "Truite bleu" - shown to her swimming in a pail minutes before; or the eerie tale of being snowed in for a couple of days in a beach shack on the tip of Long Island during a fierce storm. A couple of other favorite writers of the past who didn't do badly by food: Ludwig Bemelmans, A.J. Liebling ... like the way we can "see" a place when it's written well, so can we "taste" the experience of food - or part of it, anyway.

ceceliauna

Even without EK, good recommendations! Let´s wait for her.

cigalechanta

Tomass, I'm going back to the restaurant that MFK had her first truite Bleu for the third time and again will have the truite Bleu.
Also reading her those many years ago was why I traveled alone the first time and dined at La Train Bleu.

tomassocroccante

Mimi, what a fantastic thing! TB is obviously one of those dishes that some of us moderns might have trouble coming to terms with ...
But interesting in so many ways way.

I like French food. But I confess I love Italian food. Do you know the great exchange in the film "Summertime"? La Signora Fiorini, operator of the pensione, is steaming after the American retiree Mr. McIlhenny says "This Wop food has ruined my digestion!"
Sra. Fiorini: "He probably likes French food!"
Katherine Hepburn as Jane Hudson: "I must say, I did."
Sra. Fiorini: "But it has no soul! In France, you sit down to eat and what do you get? A sauce! In Italy you sit down to a MEAL! And in America this Mr. Mac - whatever - he sits down and what does he eat? Pills! Nothing but pills!"

franco

Gorgeous, and above all: true, as far as the Italian attitude is concerned. I have a friend in Italy (and I don't think he knows that film) who once actually told me, with regard to foreign food, and very disgusted: "Non è ch'io possa mangiare cose unte, con SALSE." - i.e. Please don't think I could eat drowned food, with sauces. Cose unte, this has remained a household word with me ever since.

franco

ek, I know you're back!! First of all, I hope you've enjoyed your trip; second, here is a question waiting for you: favourite Italian cookbooks (see above) - expert advice needed! More questions, btw, are waiting for you on "Rome trip/food report"!

ekscrunchy

Ciao Franco!!! Yes, I am back..physically anyway..I am still a little foggy from jet lag and from this horrid cold I seem to have caught. Anyway, I will be "back in the saddle" on this thread very soon. If you want a diversion, you can read my musings on food in Korea/China on the Asia board...some unusual foods, to say the least!

There is a new cookbook by Lidia Bastianich, "Lidia's Italy," that I am going to order at the library as soon as I get out of the house. She has an interesting new tv show; yesterday, I watched her visit a market in Palermo and make an easy calamari salad. The ingedients were only calamari; peperoncino; lemon rind and juice; orange rind; bay leaves; olive oil. (I hope I am not forgetting any here..)

franco

ek, do you think it's possible to contract cold via internet? I have catched it, too...

ekscrunchy

Franco that is because you are so simpatico! Feel better! I will be caught up and back at full steam in a few days!

plafield

Back to Radicchio, if I may. I dined at a very good Italian restaurant last night (not in Italy, so not really Italian, I suppose)and for a special they were offering a salad of Travesano radicchio and asparagas. I remembered the discussion here and asked where he radicchio was from and the server went to ask the manager and came back and said it came from outside of Venice. I ordered the salad, although I have never been fond of radicchio and even though I remembered that Franco said the season for radicchio is winter.

Of course, it's spring and asparagas are fresh and in season right now. The salad was composed of green and white baby asparagas, grilled, with a pile of bright red/purple radicchio and some spring greens, dressed in a light, slightly sweet, vinagrette.

The redicchio was spicy and a tad bit bitter but not like most of the radicchio I've tried in the past and the salad was delicious, but what the heck is Trevasano Radicchio? Is it the dreaded unedible stuff (not to my taste) or the good stuff and how can it be here and available in spring if the right season is winter?

And if winter is the only season to really enjoy the good stuff, should I not bother to order it when I'm in Venice at the end of May?

ekscrunchy

Franco will better answer this, but Trevisano radicchio is long-leaved and kind of torpedo shaped. I saw some beautiful heads in the market (Citarella) here in NYC this morning. One great thing besides the taste is that it keeps a very long time in the frig. It is nice just grilled in a cast iron pan and dressed with a sturdy viniagrette.

Radicchio of Verona is the round-headed one that you may not like.

In many markets here they say this stuff is from Italy but I wonder if that is true or is it grown in California. Same thing with frisee..they mark it Italian frisee but can they really ship lettuce here from Italy or is just from Italian seeds?? I suppose they can import it, I guess, since we get blood oranges and other perishables but I do wonder about the origin of these... I will ask next time I am in a good Italian market.

plafield

I asked if the radicchio was really from Italy and they assured me it was. This particular restaurant has a lot of things imported from Italy that show up as specials on the menu. I really did enjoy that salad but am dying to try that special Venetian radicchio that is in season in winter. I suppose I'll have to plan a another trip for that!

tomassocroccante

There is something slightly insane about shipping lettuce by air from half way around the world ... I wonder if there is enough of the delicate stuff in Italy for transatlantic export?
Then again, considering how much produce we receive from the southern hemisphere, maybe not so unlikely.