Italian cuisine goes back a long way and it has taken many centuries for it to evolve though the earliest roots go all the way back to the fourth century BC. In addition, it also has some Arab influence as too Norman influences and who does not know about the great chef Maestro Martino who has refined the Italian cuisine to a considerably higher level. Traditional Italian food as we know it in the New World has a lot of potatoes and bell pepper as well as tomatoes and maize in it, and these were used in considerable quantities about the time of the eighteenth century.

Different Regional Variations

However, it is safe to say that the types of ingredients used and dishes served up in traditional Italian food are known to differ from one region to the other in Italy and it is usual to find many a different regional dish that has attained national importance, and which have also proliferated in different parts of the country as well. Of course, people would generally associate cheese as also wine with traditional Italian food because these played an important role in Italian cuisine both at the regional and also national level.

One can even add coffee and the famous cappuccino coffee as being a major part of traditional Italian food. Also, the courts that flourished in Rome, Florence and Ferrara and Venice have each played an important role in the creation of many fine traditional Italian food dishes and a particular example is the court of Estes in Ferrara that created a lot of high cuisine. Furthermore, traditional Italian food was eulogized when in the year 1570, Bartolomeo Scappi wrote Opera and this gentleman who Pope Pius V’s personal chef was created a voluminous work that exemplified the best of traditional Italian food cooking methods and it contained more than a thousand different recipes.

Till the modern era began, what we now know as Italy today was in fact being governed by the Spanish and French as well as Austrians until the eighteenth century after which there was a decided regional influence in traditional Italian food and Italian chefs consciously tried to instill a sense of pride in Italian cuisine as opposed to the high cuisine that was known in France.

What’s more, from the eighteenth century peasant diets that had much of heavy foods, many changes have taken place in traditional Italian food and the foods began to include kidneys and anchovies as well as lemon and Gnocchi all Romana that are still relevant today.

Tags: Italian food, traditional cooking

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