Italian Cuisine: A Cultural History

 Hello everyone! I will introduce the book I chose for this class, Italian Cuisine: A Cultural History by Alberto Capatti and Massimo Montanari.

Reading this book taught me a lot about Italian cuisine's history. Compared to my other classmates' books, mine is more focused on the history of Italian cuisine, and it doesn't have many pictures; instead, it has a map of Italy. 

Among the numerous facts I learned from this book, the first is that the Italians used forks 300 years before other Europeans, presumably because they needed to handle slippery and dangerously hot pasta. The second is that the Italians invented chilling drinks and may have originated ice cream. The third is that Italian culinary practices inspired the rest of Europe to focus more on vegetables and less on meat. The last one is that salad has been a distinguishing feature of Italian cuisine since the fifteenth century.

Although I only have read half of the book, it has taught me many lessons we cannot normally learn in a classroom. It changed my perspective of Italian cuisine, and it will continue to do so.