Overview

What is Italy without pasta? Come to think of it, where would the rest of us be without this staple of global cuisine? An acclaimed Italian food writer tells the colorful and often-surprising history of everyone's favorite dish. In this hugely charming and entertaining chronicle of everyone's favorite dish, acclaimed Italian food writer and historian Luca Cesari draws on literature, history, and many classic recipes in order to enlighten pasta lovers everywhere, both the gourmet and the gluten free. What is Italy without pasta? Come to think of it, where would the rest of us be without this staple of global cuisine? The wheat-based dough first appeared in the Mediterranean in ancient times. Yet despite these remote beginnings, pasta wasn't wedded to sauce until the nineteenth century. Once a special treat, it has been served everywhere from peasant homes to rustic taverns to royal tables, and its surprising past holds a mirror up to the changing fortunes of its makers. Full of mouthwatering recipes and outlandish anecdotes--from (literal) off-the-wall 1880s cooking techniques to spaghetti conveyer belts in 1940 and the international amatriciana scandal in 2021--Luca Cesari embarks on a tantalizing and edifying journey through time to detangle the heritage of this culinary classic.

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9781639363162

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If cooking pasta correctly is a religion, then Luca Cesari's book is the Bible. --Russell Norman, founder of Polpo and Brutto

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"Luca Cesari is a food historian based in Italy. He writes for various magazines, including Gambero Rosso, and writes the column ""Indovina chi sviene a cent"" in Il Sole 24 Ore. As an inappetent child in 1970s Bologna, he was lovingly fed with tagliatelle alla bolognese and tortellini by his grandmother. Perhaps for this reason, Cesari is interested in the history of gastronomy, in particular the birth of the most famous and representative dishes of the Italian tradition. This is his first book. Johanna Bishop is an American translator of history, art criticism, fiction, and poetry. She has been living in Tuscany for over twenty years and translating professionally since 2004."

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