The atlas · A cuisine · Italy

Italian

Also Cucina italiana, Roman, Neapolitan

Not one cuisine but twenty regional ones, united by a respect for a few very good ingredients and the argument about how each dish is 'really' made.

Where it comes from

Italy became one country only in 1861, and its cooking is still regional first. In 1891 Pellegrino Artusi published a cookbook collecting recipes from across the new nation, sometimes called the book that taught Italians to cook each other's food.

Tomatoes came from the Americas and were slowly accepted — in the south by the eighteenth century, when Naples made them its own. Dried pasta, from Gragnano and Naples, became the everyday food of the south; fresh egg pasta belongs more to the north.

Where in it

  1. Rome and LazioThrifty, bold cooking of pecorino, guanciale, black pepper and offal — and four great pastas, carbonara, cacio e pepe, gricia and amatriciana, argued over bowl by bowl.CarbonaraCacio e pepe
  2. Naples and CampaniaThe home of pizza, of dried pasta from nearby Gragnano, and of the tomato's first embrace in Italy; buffalo mozzarella comes from the plains to the north.Pizza napoletana
  3. Bologna and Emilia-RomagnaBologna la grassa, the fat one: fresh egg pasta rolled by hand, ragù and mortadella — with parmesan and prosciutto made just up the road around Parma.Ragù alla bologneseTortellini in brodo
  4. Milan and LombardyButter and rice more than oil and pasta, from the paddies of the Po plain — saffron risotto, ossobuco, and the breaded veal cutlet alla milanese.Risotto alla milanese
  5. Genoa and LiguriaA thin coast between the mountains and the sea, with small-leaved basil, light olive oil, focaccia and farinata — and pesto, pounded in marble mortars.Pesto alla genovese
  6. SicilyGreek, Arab, Norman and Spanish rulers each left something: rice and citrus, sugar and almonds, sweet-and-sour sauces, and street food eaten standing at the counter.AranciniCaponataPasta alla Norma

How it cooks

Mantecatura
Beating fat and cheese into pasta or risotto at the end, with starchy water, until it turns creamy.
Soffritto
Onion, carrot and celery cooked slowly in oil or butter — the base of sauces and braises.
Finishing pasta in its sauce
Pasta pulled a minute early and cooked through in the pan, so the sauce clings.

Always in the kitchen

olive oilparmesanpecorinoguancialetinned tomatogarlicbasilanchovycaperdried pastarisotto ricelemonparsleydried chilli

Cook from it

Tonight, with what's good in October

Its classics

ItalianCarbonaraPasta with crisp guanciale, bound off the heat in a sauce of egg yolk, pecorino and black pepper.No one here has made it yetItalianCacio e pepePasta, pecorino romano, black pepper and the pasta's own starchy water, whisked into a creamy sauce.No one here has made it yetItalianRagù alla bologneseA slow sauce of minced beef and pork with soffritto, a little tomato, wine and milk — served with tagliatelle.No one here has made it yetItalianRisotto alla milaneseRice cooked slowly in stock with saffron and beef marrow, then beaten with butter and parmesan until golden and flowing.No one here has made it yetItalianAranciniBalls or cones of cooked rice around a filling of ragù or ham and cheese, breadcrumbed and fried until crisp.No one here has made it yetItalianCaponataFried aubergine with celery, onion, tomato, capers and olives, in a sweet-and-sour sauce of vinegar and sugar.No one here has made it yetItalianTiramisùSponge fingers dipped in espresso and layered with a cream of mascarpone, egg and sugar, finished with bitter cocoa.No one here has made it yetItalianPizza napoletanaA soft round of long-risen dough, topped simply — tomato, mozzarella, basil, oil — and baked for about a minute in a wood-fired oven until blistered at the rim.No one here has made it yetItalianPesto alla genoveseBasil pounded with garlic, pine nuts, salt, parmesan and pecorino, loosened with olive oil and tossed raw through trofie or trenette.No one here has made it yetItalianTortellini in brodoTiny rings of fresh egg pasta around a filling of pork, mortadella, prosciutto and parmesan, served in a clear meat broth.No one here has made it yetItalianPasta alla NormaPasta in a sauce of tomato, garlic and basil with fried aubergine, under a snow of grated ricotta salata.No one here has made it yet

How it got here

800s–1000s · from Ifriqiya, now Tunisia to PalermoCitrus, sugar and riceArab rule in Sicily, from the ninth century, brought bitter oranges and lemons, sugar cane and rice to the island. Arancini are often linked to that time, though the fried rice ball as it's known today is much younger.Arancini →
1500s–1700s · from The Americas to NaplesTomatoesTomatoes crossed from the Americas in the sixteenth century and were long treated with suspicion in Europe. By the eighteenth, Naples had made them its own.

Cooked here

No one here has cooked Italian yet.