Introduction to Italian Cuisine -Bureau of Taste:
In the nineteenth century, modern-day Italy was a group of separate republics.
Unification created a single state.
But people carried on cooking according to local tradition, resulting in a country with an enormously varied cuisine.
Traditionally, the country’s wealth comes from northern Italy.
It had trade routes with the rest of Europe – but most importantly, the port of Venice imported coffee, spices and sugar since the Middle Ages.
Salts were used to cure meat like bresaola, salami and pancetta, and trading in luxuries afforded expensive food: liqueurs, nougat, osso bucco, truffles and nuts.
Central Italy is known as the country’s ‘breadbasket’: rolling Tuscan hills and green grazing pastures surrounding Bologna and Umbria.
Spelt or farro is one of the oldest crops, with pasta, bread and beans forming the base to most meals.
Tuscan beef stew, and carafes of Chianti shape day-to-day of life in this agricultural part of Italy.
The craggy, dry and comparatively poor south of Italy owes its rich cuisine to past invasions: honey, olives and nuts from the Ancient Greeks, and citrus trees from the Byzantines.
Aubergine is used as ‘the poor man’s meat’, and buffalo milk is turned into the region’s most famous export – mozzarella.
While pizza, pasta, and ice cream are products of unified Italy, for a true taste of the country you should start with authentic, local dishes which can be found in Bocca, The Silver Spoon and Marcella Hazan’s Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking.
Remembering Marcella Hazan, Who Brought A Taste Of Italy To America : The Salt : NPR:
Marcella Hazan (April 15, 1924 – September 29, 2013) was an Italian-born cooking writer whose books were published in English.
Recipe: 'Roast Chicken With Lemons'
If this were a still life its title could be "Chicken with Two Lemons."
That is all that there is in it.
No fat to cook with, no basting to do, no stuffing to prepare, no condiments except for salt and pepper.
After you put the chicken in the oven you turn it just once.
The bird, its two lemons, and the oven do all the rest.
Again and again, through the years, I meet people who come up to me to say, "I have made your chicken with two lemons and it is the most amazingly simple recipe, the juiciest, best-tasting chicken I have ever had."
And you know, it is perfectly true.
Serves 4
1-2kg chicken
Salt
Black pepper, ground fresh from the mill
2 rather small lemons
In the nineteenth century, modern-day Italy was a group of separate republics.
Unification created a single state.
But people carried on cooking according to local tradition, resulting in a country with an enormously varied cuisine.
Traditionally, the country’s wealth comes from northern Italy.
It had trade routes with the rest of Europe – but most importantly, the port of Venice imported coffee, spices and sugar since the Middle Ages.
Salts were used to cure meat like bresaola, salami and pancetta, and trading in luxuries afforded expensive food: liqueurs, nougat, osso bucco, truffles and nuts.
Central Italy is known as the country’s ‘breadbasket’: rolling Tuscan hills and green grazing pastures surrounding Bologna and Umbria.
Spelt or farro is one of the oldest crops, with pasta, bread and beans forming the base to most meals.
Tuscan beef stew, and carafes of Chianti shape day-to-day of life in this agricultural part of Italy.
The craggy, dry and comparatively poor south of Italy owes its rich cuisine to past invasions: honey, olives and nuts from the Ancient Greeks, and citrus trees from the Byzantines.
Aubergine is used as ‘the poor man’s meat’, and buffalo milk is turned into the region’s most famous export – mozzarella.
While pizza, pasta, and ice cream are products of unified Italy, for a true taste of the country you should start with authentic, local dishes which can be found in Bocca, The Silver Spoon and Marcella Hazan’s Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking.
Remembering Marcella Hazan, Who Brought A Taste Of Italy To America : The Salt : NPR:
Marcella Hazan (April 15, 1924 – September 29, 2013) was an Italian-born cooking writer whose books were published in English.
Recipe: 'Roast Chicken With Lemons'
If this were a still life its title could be "Chicken with Two Lemons."
That is all that there is in it.
No fat to cook with, no basting to do, no stuffing to prepare, no condiments except for salt and pepper.
After you put the chicken in the oven you turn it just once.
The bird, its two lemons, and the oven do all the rest.
Again and again, through the years, I meet people who come up to me to say, "I have made your chicken with two lemons and it is the most amazingly simple recipe, the juiciest, best-tasting chicken I have ever had."
And you know, it is perfectly true.
Serves 4
1-2kg chicken
Salt
Black pepper, ground fresh from the mill
2 rather small lemons
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