Italian Cookbooks
Northern Italian Food

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Recipes from Paradise: Life and Food on the Italian Riviera
by Fred Plotkin

Fred Plotkin brings together passion and scholarship, poetry, history, and vivid images of Liguria in Recipes from Paradise, a meticulous and loving record of the region known as the Italian Riviera. Literate and richly written, even florid at times, it documents the interplay of land and sea elemental to Ligurian life in fascinating detail. The alluring, authentic recipes include Stuffed Basil Leaves, Chestnut Gnocchi, and Polenta Incatenata, made with beans, cabbage, and potatoes. Ingredient lists give measures by weight (ounces), volume (cups), and grams, and oven temperatures in Fahrenheit and Centigrade. Some may find this thoroughness distracting, but it makes the book useful to anyone anywhere. More challenging than the careful measurements is the windy narrative form Plotkin employs in the steps for making the dishes; with so many words to wade through, the style may make finding your place difficult. Italophiles and cookbook literati, however, will not care about Plotkin's verbosity as they are blissfully transported and enlightened by the recipes and descriptions.

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Cooking in Piedmont
by Roberto Donna, Roberto Donna, Ted Boehm (Photographer)

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La Terra Fortunata: The Splendid Food and Wine of Friuli-Venezia Giulia
by Fred Plotkin

The Italian region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia is perhaps the least well known by Americans. Tucked away in the northeastern corner of Italy, stretching almost from Venice to Vienna, the region proudly grows the widest range of grape varieties in all of Italy. The Friulians, therefore, are extraordinarily aware of the interaction between food and wine. Fred Plotkin wrote La Terra Fortunata after 25 years of visiting the small region. His knowledge of its food, its wine, and its people and their customs is immense. Plotkin offers a comprehensive history of the region and great insight and understanding in his choice of recipes and their instructions.

There are few generalities that can be used to describe this collection. Friulians are great wine drinkers and have a reputation for working hard, and so have a custom of eating small dishes to wash down with their wine and to satisfy their hunger between meals. So it's no surprise that many of these dishes can be served alongside one another. The herbs and spices used are not necessarily those we think of as Italian; they are much more international. Yogurt-Dill Sauce sounds Greek and Mustard-Wine Sauce sounds French, but both they and Montasio-Mint Sauce can be found in Friuli (the Montasio cheese gets just a hint of mint, beautiful on pasta or soft polenta). From a garlicky Mussel Frittata to the most traditional Frico Croccante (a thin crispy pancake made entirely of cheese, it makes a delicious cup for Gnocchi with Mountain Herbs or Risotto with Crabmeat and Peas), Plotkin's recipes are flavorful, unusual, and well explained. Because the region stretches from the coast to the mountains, traditional cooking includes everything from seafood to game and every herb, vegetable, and fruit under the sun. Plotkin introduces every recipe with a story, and they, along with his guide to Friulian wines, make La Terra Fortunata an indispensable guidebook both for the cook and for the armchair traveler.

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The Classic Food of Northern Italy
by Anna Del Conte

In this sumptuous collection of dishes, drawn from all the regions of northern Italy, Anna Del Conte has chosen the very best recipes garnered from restaurants, home kitchens, and country farms. Many of the dishes are likely to be unfamiliar, such as flatbread made with chickpea flour, the Ligurian fish soup known as Ciuppin, or macaroni in a sweet pastry case. Del Conte's distinctive interpretations of more well-known dishes, such as pesto and rag, gnocchi, risotto, and ossobuco, will endear themselves to cooks as the versions that really work. This is a collection that is bound to become a favorite volume in every cook's library. Anna Del Conte was born and educated in Milan. Her many successful books include Italian Kitchen, Gli Antipasti, I Dolci, La Pastaciutta, I Risotti, and Gastronomy of Italy.

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