Italian cuisine : a cultural history / Alberto Capatti & Massimo Montanari ; translated by Aine O'Healy.

ISBN:

9780231509046

Title:

Author:

Capatti, Alberto, 1944-

Personal Author:

Capatti, Alberto, 1944-

Uniform Title:

Cucina italiana. English

Publication Information:

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xx, 348 pages) : illustrations, map.

Series:

Arts and traditions of the table

Contents:

Introduction: Identity as Exchange -- Italy: A Physical and Mental Space -- The Italian Way of Eating -- The Formation of Taste -- The Sequence of Dishes -- Communicating Food: The Recipe Collection -- The Vocabulary of Food -- The Cook, the Innkeeper, and the Woman of the House -- Science and Technology in the Kitchen -- Toward a History of the Appetite.

Local Note:

eBooks on EBSCOhost

Subject Term:

Cooking, Italian -- History.

Gastronomy -- History.

Geographic Term:

Italy -- Social life and customs.

Added Author:

Montanari, Massimo, 1949-

O'Healy, Áine.

Format:

Electronic Resources

Electronic Access:

Click here to view

Publication Date:

2003

Publication Information:

Available:*

Shelf Number	Material Type	Copy	Shelf Location	Status
641.594509 21	1:E-BOOK	1	1:ONLINE	Searching... Unknown

Bound With These Titles

On Order

Summary

This magnificent new book demonstrates the development of a distinctive, unified culinary tradition throughout the Italian peninsula. Thematically organized and beautifully illustrated, Italian Cuisine is a rich history of the ingredients, dishes, techniques, and social customs behind the Italian food we know and love today.

Author Notes

Alberto Capatti is author of several books on food and eating and editor of the food section of Einaudi's History of Italy . Massimo Montanari teaches medieval history at the University of Bologna and is the preeminent historian of Italian food and eating habits. He is author of A History of European Nutrition and The Magic Pot , and co-editor of Food: A Culinary History (Columbia, 1999).

Reviews (2)

Booklist Review

The latest volume in the Art and Traditions of the Table series focuses on the cultural history of Italian cooking. With an authoritative command of the subject, Capatti and Montanari trace the changing vocabulary of Italy's earliest cookbooks from classical Latin to vernacular Italian, showing how this shift reflected the increasing significance of passing culinary skill from one generation to the next. Bit by bit, Italian cookbook writers also eliminated Gallicisms from their vocabulary to express the uniqueness of Italian cooking. Pleasures of the table then, as today, related to images of health and well being, the north favoring voluptuous fatness, the south tending to ascetic thinness. The authors limn the decline of the servant class and the gradual shift to femininity in the Italian kitchen. Contrary to contemporary emphases on Italian cookery as an agglomeration of microcuisines, Capatti and Montanari stress its unity across the nation. This relentlessly academic work has an impressive bibliography of historic Italian sources. --Mark Knoblauch Copyright 2003 Booklist

Library Journal Review

In this history of Italy's food, cooking, and eating, the authors have opted for an "everything including the kitchen sink" approach. Throughout, Capatti, who has written several books on food and eating, and Montanari (history, Univ. of Bologna) offer extensive lists of foodstuffs and names of dishes, sometimes to the detriment of the point they are trying to make. Organized topically rather than chronologically, the book constantly folds back on itself, leaving the reader with an ongoing feeling of familiarity with recurring names but not with an appropriate context. Although the topics range widely, from the lexicon of Italian food to the dress code for kitchen staff, one senses that there are still gaps. The 20th century and the effects of the open European Community on Italian eating, for example, are scarcely touched. The wealth of notes and suggested readings are the book's greatest offering. Suitable for academic libraries.-Peter Hepburn, Univ. of Illinois at Chicago Lib. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Introduction

Identity as Exchange Italy

A Physical and Mental Space

The Italian Way of Eating

The Formation of Taste

The Sequence of Dishes

Communicating Food

The Recipe Collection

The Vocabulary of Food

The Cook, the Innkeeper, and the Woman of the House

Science and Technology in the Kitchen

Toward a History of the Appetite

Available:*

Bound With These Titles

On Order

Summary

Summary

Author Notes

Reviews (2)

Booklist Review

Library Journal Review

Table of Contents