The Food of Italy: A Culinary Guidebook

This book is sold as a companion volume to Root's The Food of France, though the two are of quite different character. Whereas the French volume shows a deep and intimate familiarity with a beloved cuisine that has largely weathered the cultural purges in France since WW2, the Italian volume shows the author as a traveler in a country in which he felt less at home, where he was cataloguing a highly diverse culinary landscape more or less dish by dish. The resulting compendium feels a bit compulsory, as though Root were eating his way through a checklist, the breadth and depth of which were not apparent before he'd spent his advance. Several times his nicely-written narrative verges on tedium, as when he catalogues the minor wines of Umbria or enumerates the differences between the sausages of Modena and those of Bologna. Missing is the rapture and warmth of the French volume.But one must not disparage the content of this less-than-ecstatic reportage: there is more on Italian food recorded here than in any other book I've been able to find in English. He sytematically hits the culinary high points of the entire country, region by region. Unfortunately, much of what he recorded is now lost, or at least homogenized into one national cuisine. Travelers to Italy will be forgiven for assuming that pizza is as much Florentine as it is Neopolitan now that Florence boasts maybe 50 good pizzerie. The highly local traditions Root recorded have largely disappeared. So consider this book to be a touching record of a lost gustatory landscape and of the heroic, not always inspired, travels of a lonely American far from his home in France.

Food is more than what science can make of it. It includes culture. (That only follows when we realize that food is our connection with both agri-culture and how we cultivate our relations with one another among other things.) Waverly Root has a natural gift for writing "poetically" which enables the reader to begin imagining the regional environments of Italy that he describes. I have never been to Italy. However I am gaining lively images of Italy by way Root's descriptions of Italy's regional foods. One of the things that I most appreciate is that Root gives us his direct observations as well as his direct experience of the foods themselves as they are presented in each of the regions. This is far superior to any academic descriptions of a "Mediterranean Diet"! How refreshing!

This book is exactly what I was looking for! I am half way through, and the book is well organized by different regions in Italy. It explains the history and how different cultures at different periods of time influenced the food and continue to influence the food today. The author adds entertaining comments, it doesn't get dry, and includes the Italian word for foods which is very helpful. This is the first book I found that was able to tell the story of food in Italy so well.

This book was recommended to me because of its in-depth historical accounts of each area of Italy. My Grandparents were from South Italy, and this book explained the history of each region-- I have never seen that anywhere else. What a gem!

This is a brilliant and detailed description of not just the cuisine of Italy, but also the geography and history of this beautiful country. This was recommended to me as I planned an Italian getaway, and I learned about more than just food. Excellent guide that goes beyond what the usual travel guides and history books contain. I do not consider myself a foodie or food expert- I'm just a curious traveler who happens to enjoy a good meal and glass of wine, so this was an eye opening read for me.

I loved the recipes. I traveled to Italy and my parents both came from Italy and I can tell you that the food in this book is authentic Italian cuisine. I have allready recommended this cook book to many friends.They love it as well. The ingredients are all easy to find. I'm very lucky to have Italian grocery stores near me that carry some of the imported items. You won't be sorry you bought this book. Even if you bought the cook book for the pictures and the food history stories.

This was recomended to me by my friend Marco in South Beach. The son of an Italian, San Francisco restauranteur, he believes this book is key to understanding Italian food culture.This book is twice as thick as The Food Of France by the same author.

a gift so i can keep mine. this is the best all round book on italian cooking in print. not a cook book but a travel book to all the great cooking experiences in italy , not the up to date fancy ones but good solid italian cooking lore. he has one also one on france which is equally as good. but for anyone who claims to like italian this is tops.a wonderful gift i use it often,

As with his survey of French food, a master work, going region by region, province by province. More time devoted to wines than in his /French survey, but the Italian wine scene has changed so much since the 70's, that much is outdated - e.g. "you are not likely to find the vintage year indicated on Chianti or any Italian wine bottles".

Ich hab dies buch erst vor kurzem entdeckt. Es ist grossartig, Man sagt das seit vielen Jahren dies wunderbar stimmungsvolle Buch eine unverzichtbare Lektüre für den Reisenden ist, um die Küche Italiens zu genießen sowie seine Städte und Dörfer zu erkunden. Das ist wahr, aber es ist auch ein wenig in die Jahre gekommen seit es zum erste mal publiziert wurde vor 51 Jahre. Aber davon abgesehen ist es ebenso unerlässlich es für den Koch, der die Feinheiten des italienischen Gaumens in seiner eigenen Küche einfangen wollte.Mit viel Lehrreiches und allgegenwärtiger Neugierde erkundet Waverley Root alle Nebenwege einer Küche, die so nuanciert ist, dass selbst die grundlegenden ragu Bolognese etwa zweihundert Variationen haben.The Food of Italy führt uns von der gesetzlich vorgeschriebenen Sparsamkeit der Renaissance-Tafel bis zum dauerhaften sarazenischen Luxus der sizilianischen Desserts, von der Lasagne von Bolognese bis zum Saltimbocca a la romana (was wörtlich hupf im Mund" bedeutet) von Rom. Auf seinen Seiten erfahren wir von einem Elefanten, der gezwungen war, den Winter 1551 in Südtirol zu verbringen, und den nach ihm benannten Gerichten, von der richtigen Art und Weise, Chianti in Flaschen abzufüllen, und von den Fabeln, die den Ursprung der Tortellini umgeben. Hier ist also ein Buch, das die Aromen Italiens zusammenfasst und die geheimnisvolle und wunderbare Essenz aller italienischen Dinge vermittelt.Waverly Root seine Werke sind Klassiker. Und dies, ist der Klassiker unter seine Werke. Waverly Root war ein sehr wichtiger Foodie-Schriftsteller. Er hat die Entwicklung der Küche in der USA mit geprägt und war sehr einflussreich. Seine Schreibweise ist sehr unterhaltsam. Er beschreibt nicht nur die Produkte oder Rezepte, aber auch deren Hintergrund und Kulturelle Aspekte davon.Das buch besteht aus viele kurze Artikel die je eine Sache behandeln. Diese sind unterhaltsam und sehr gut geschrieben. Herrlicher Schmöker.