Il Cibo

You can’t talk about Italy without talking about food. Italian food is an imprint of the unique and diverse history of Italy. Northern food is much different than southern food and food today is much different than Italian food in the past. In Italy, there is nothing like a ripe Marzano tomato grown from volcanic enriched soil, but tomatoes were not actually native to Italy. Tomatoes were introduced into Europe in the 1500s with the Spanish exploration of the Americas. Yes, the Americas actually gave tomatoes to Italy and probably originated in the Andes somewhere. The indigenous tribes in the Andes were a unique group of individuals that had a long history of breeding nightshade plants and tubers into an edible version due to their high altitude and harsh climate conditions. Tomatoes and potatoes all use to be poisonous to humans! It took 200 hundred years for the tomato to really catch on in Italy due to its rumored poisonous properties, but once it did the Italians perfected the growth and use of tomatoes. While elites were the first to enjoy the decadent new produce, they couldn’t prevent nature (birds) from distributing the seeds to any and all peasants in the countryside.

Another staple in Italian life is the daily espresso—prendi il caffé?—is asked by any good host when you enter an Italian home. Again, before the 17th century, this would not be the case. Coffee was a native plant to the volcanic and tropical mountain regions of Ethiopia. Arab traders brought it to Italy via Venice seeing its potential as a drug due to its stimulating effects. Yet again, the Italians proved to be the masters of perfecting the art of coffee and not inventing it. This is actually somewhat of a theme in Italian culture, the Greeks brought classical art, but the Italians also perfected it! That wasn’t the only thing that came to Italy via Greece, Italian gold, also known as olive oil, owes its dues to Mesopotamia. The olive tree was introduced into the Mediterranean region around 2500 B.C. Olives have been harvested in Italy for a very long time, but they did not originate there, their popularity in the region surpasses no other and olive oil is used for a multitude of things including—cooking, dipping sauces, polishing stone and marble, and moisturizer if needed.

Italian food is much more simple than the American version of it. Italians actually don’t eat as much as Americans think either. Espresso and biscotti dipped in warm milk are about as fancy as breakfast gets and dinner is often prosciutto on bread with a little basil, mozzarella, and tomato. Lunch is the main meal of the day and often contains a light pasta course with a small meat or fish course and of course always a lot of fresh vegetables. My personal favorite is grilled baby zucchini and red peppers with olive oil or Angela’s mother's stuffed eggplant. Italian food is generally healthy and balance. The Italians enjoy a little of everything and rarely eat large amounts of one item. Even the Italian pizza—a whole pizza for one individual—is a light meal with paper-thin dough and less cheese or meat toppings compared to the American version. The Italians eat, take a stroll, rest, and repeat.

My absolute favorite meal is a dish that Angela’s grandmother used to make us which was essentially really old bread so crusty and hard that the only way to make it edible was to create a flavorful soup broth and quickly submerge the bread in it and plop it on a plate. Nonna would then poach an egg in the broth and add it to the sliced bread, topping it off with fresh olive oil, tomatoes, olives, and salt and pepper. Angela told me this was poor people’s food used to make bread last longer, it tasted like a million bucks to me. In fact, it has been impossible to get the right kind of hard exterior crusty sourdough bread needed to really do it justice, until now! Recently I discovered Easy Tiger in North Austin makes a commercial version of the classic southern Italian rustic bread which can be pre-ordered online. I highly recommend giving it a try as it is the real deal.

Italian food is the culmination of the mix of people and societies that have passed through the European continent and Mediterranean bay leaving their stamp on the Italian landscape and local practices. This is the reason the food is so varied and rich in flavor, from the risottos and meat dishes of the north to the African and Middle Eastern-inspired dishes in the deep south to the Spanish and French influence in the center, the food of Italy is a mosaic.