The Gastronomy of Italy

This book is a good start for initiating an Italian cooking affair; it gives you dictionary of ingredients, regional description, and few recipes. The recipes represent important Italian ingredients and cooking techniques, they aren't simple (Lasagna like dish made with Polenta sheets - for example) but capture the Italian flavors and texture. When you've got the Italian taste, you can use (return to) other books with more complete list of Italian recipes, and this book can be used as a reference book, for finding ingredients substitutes, and basic pasta handling. In addition the book is beautiful and the recipes are very tasty.

`the Gastronomy of Italy' by Anna Del Conte is a dandy little reference to regional Italian recipes, products, wines, and techniques. The list of the author's other works and the imprimatur of the Accademia Italiana Della Cucina demonstrates that this is no quickie knock-off by publisher, Barnes and Noble. An examination of the book's contents confirms this first impression with a very nice collection of information for the foodie, the scholar, and the traveler. The first chapter on the `development of Italian Gastronomy' is too short to compete with full length books on the subject, but it does give some interesting perspective in twelve (12) pages, with the claim that Italians owned the leadership in European cuisine through the Renaissance, only to let it slip away to the French with the political disintegration of the late seventeenth century. By far the most interesting content of this chapter is the account of major culinary works by Italians from the fifteenth century to the present. It is a revelation to hear writers of 400 years ago advising their readers to concentrate on fresh, seasonal produce. So this was not an idea invented by Alice Waters! The second chapter on the Italian food culture fills out the picture we get from watching `Molto Mario'. It gives a very nice little list of major Italian food markets, which is a useful guide for someone wishing to create a culinary tour of Italy. The only thing I missed was a description of `Enoteca', the name of an Italian wine bar. The chapter on the culinary regions of Italy gets down to serious business. This profile is a great introduction, but again, it cannot compete with complete books written on the subject such as Claudia Roden's `The Food of Italy', Erica DeMane's `The Flavors of Southern Italy', and Micol Negrin's `Rustico' or the classic `The Foods of Italy' by Waverley Root. But, if you just want a quick look around, this will do the job, as long as you realize there is much this chapter is leaving out. The next two chapters are the heart of the book and the primary reason you will want to buy it. First, there are 130 pages of recipes organized by ingredient or course, with headnotes that often indicate the geographical source of the recipe. Surprisingly, several recipes also come from American and English sources such as Marcella Hazan and Alan Davidson. It is a pleasant surprise to find the recipes in such an omnibus volume written with a keen eye to guiding the amateur to getting things right. A lot of cautions and advice which could easily be taken for granted are carefully spelled out, as when the recipe for polenta describes the delicate task of slowly streaming the corn meal into the pot with one hand while constantly stirring the pot with the other. Well done Anna! The only oddity with this selection of recipes is in the fact that the meat chapter is larger than the vegetable section, with lots of space being given to veal and beef recipes. While not even close to bein

I haven't dug into this book fully yet, but since there wasn't an in-depth review, I'll add my quick two cents. Areas covered include a brief history of Italian cuisine, and a region-by-region look at history and specialties. There are recipes, naturally, but the depth of the glossary sections (separate glossaries for ingredients and Italian terms/techniques) can't be overstated. The section on wine was a little too brief, but that information can absolutely be found elsewhere. I have the paperback version of this book, which I'm guessing is the same version as this one, and feel like I got a heck of a gift from my step-sister this Xmas. While I really like the cookbooks of Lidia Bastianich (pictures are nice - this paperback has none, and the recipe variety is better), this book should be treated more as a reference than a cookbook. A solid addition to your kitchen, or even to your backpack if you're traveling Italy and want to decode the menu.

Being a huge fan of Italian cooking (and quite a good novice in my own right) I was very eager to find a good cookbook on the subject especially after returning from a month long culinary tour of the pennisula in November. Well, I hit the jackpot when a friend presented me with a copy of Gastronomy of Italy. It is a simple, beautifully written and presented book on the foods of Italy. Anybody who is looking for a really good book on Italian cooking need look no further than this. I spent over 3 hours on the first evening just savoring the recipes and drooling over the photographs!! Bella! Enjoy. Scott

This is a heavy book in weight and price, but definitely not in content. Written in an easy-flowing style, the recipes are clear, concise and uncluttered - the Author obviously loves the food and the country - it includes a potted history of cooking in the Italian peninsula, detailing the influences from France, Arabia, Germany and the New World. There are numerous references to the formative cookery writers of the past, many of whose recipes remain unchanged to this day! This is the only book I've seen with such a comprehensive list of ingredients (apart from specialist ingredients books) - almost everything available is described in detail. This list takes up nearly half the book, but is an integral part of it, as it gives one a deeper insight to each ingredient and hence the importance of its use in the recipes.The recipes themselves range from the classic & regional to the obscure & parochial and many are accompanied by delicious photographs that just beg you to try out the recipes.This is the way cookery books should be ... gets my five stars.