Why Italians love to talk about food is repeatedly brought home by Kostioukovitch’s mouth-watering descriptions. Rather than cow’s milk, buffalo milk makes “a wonderful masterpiece,” mozzarella di buffala. Each chapter sketches the region’s history and geographical characteristics, which influence its contemporary cuisine.įor example, while mountainous Trentino Alto Aldige (South Tyrol) is “almost polar” and its foods have obvious Austrian origins, in the Marches of the east coast, “everything that can be stuffed is stuffed, from wild boars to tiny olives.” Along Campania’s Amalfi coast, fertile land and abundant water support wheat farming as well as a specialty: water buffalo breeding. She travels to 19 provinces, from the Veneto and Lombardy in the north, through Liguria, Tuscany and Puglia to Sicily and Sardinia farther south. Kostioukovitch, a Russian who immigrated in 1988, spices her enlightening observations with both an outsider’s and evolving insider’s appreciation. They talk about food because it is an ardent daily quest, a shared passion, a “declaration of belonging” to a family or city or region they talk about food simply because it affords such joy.
Italy is the birthplace of the Slow Food movement and the Mediterranean Diet, recent results of Italians’ long love affair with their country’s rich and varied bounty. As demonstrated during her delightful culinary wanderings, good food is fundamental. No wonder the chain had to adapt to survive. McDonald’s has had a difficult time in Italy, reports Elena Kostioukovitch in “Why Italians Love to Talk About Food.” Some boycotts led to closures, franchises were forced to conform with local architecture and - instead of hamburgers - the restaurants serve “brioches, and slices of panettone, and.
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