Book description
Everyone loves Italian food. But how did the Italians come to eat so
well? The advertising industry tells us the answer lies in the
vineyards and olive groves of Tuscany - among sun-weathered peasants,
and mammas serving pasta under the pergola. Yet this nostalgic fantasy
has little to do with the real history of Italian cuisine.
For a thousand years, Italys cities have been magnets for everything
that makes for great eating: ingredients, talent, money, and power. So
Italian food is city food, and telling its story means telling the
story of the Italians as a people of city dwellers.
In Delizia! the author of the acclaimed Cosa Nostra
takes a revelatory historical journey through the flavours of Italys
cities. From the bustle of Medieval Milan, to the bombast of Fascist
Rome; from the pleasure gardens of Renaissance Ferrara, to the putrid
alleyways of nineteenth-century Naples. In rich slices of urban life,
Delizia! shows how violence and intrigue, as well as taste and
creativity, combined to make the worlds favourite cuisine.
