MARIANI’S

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  April 25,   2021                                                                                            NEWSLETTER



Founded in 1996 

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CAROLE LANDIS AND VICTOR MATURE IN "ONE MILLION B.C." (1940



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IN THIS ISSUE

The Master Ham Carvers of Spain
Part Two
By Gerry Dawes



CAPONE'S GOLD
CHAPTER FOUR
By John Mariani


NOTES FROM THE WINE CELLAR

As Proseccos Sales Soar, Nino Franco
Focuses on High Quality Of Terroir

By John Mariani

 

 




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On this week's episode of my WVOX Radio Show "Almost Golden," on Wed. April 28 at 11AM EST,I will be interviewing Bob Lape about French restaurants in Westchester Co. Go to: WVOX.com. The episode will also be archived at: almostgolden.




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The Master Ham Carvers of Spain
Part Two

Text and Photos By Gerry Dawes




 


        Jose Ángel Muñoz (below), Maestro Cortador of Ibérico ham for producer Arturo Sánchez in Guijuelo, is from Granada. Like many Andalucian natives who identify with bullfighting, he compares being a ham cutter to being a torero, contending that his attitude is the key to getting the best out of each jamón and that “cutting hams is like facing a bull. You have to be extremely prepared. One of my qualities is in my wrist, I have temple in it.”  Temple is that essential quality in bullfighters who have mastered the art of controlling a bull by slowing it down and measuring a pass so that a bull seems ever so fluidly and exquisitely to flow by the body of the matador.
         Muñoz believes his low-key professional ham cutting style is based on patience, perfection and dexterity—the wrist again. He also claims to “listen” to each ham, registering the way each responds as it is being carved, the level of oleic acid that may seep out from the meat, and the aroma of nuttiness, depending upon how well aged the ham is.
        "When a Maestro Cortador ‘opens’ a jamón, he or she already knows what defects and virtues the ham might have. Each ham tells you about the curing process it has undergone. The texture of the fat-infiltrated meat can tell you a lot about the quality of la montanera that the pig has undergone and about the curing process,” Muñoz says. “I still remember a ham I carved a few years ago in Sevilla that was without a doubt the best ham I have ever cut. The fat infiltration in that ham made it seem like I was cutting butter.”
       Joselito, officially Cárnicas Joselito, is a 152-year-old Ibérico producer in Guijuelo that is generally considered to be the Petrossian of fine Ibérico hams and charcuteria. Joselito jamones are literally allocated and each year’s allotment has to be partially paid for up-front, while the hams are still aging.  Pre-Covid, Joselito annually billed an estimated €40,000,000.               
       The public face behind Cárnicas Joselito is 55-year old José Gómez (right), a no-nonsense man of solid Ibérico stature who, although always dressed in a fine conservative dark business suit,  is a rock star in the gourmet food business. Over the past decade Joselito has not sponsored many product-presentation stands at gourmet shows, instead setting up its own pavilions, where Gómez entertains the culinary world’s royalty like the jamón king that he is. French Champagne flows freely and waiters pass generous plates of his jamón and charcutería Ibérico de bellota—superb caña de lomo (cured pork loin), chorizo Ibérico, salchichón (cured pink salami-like sausage) and coppa (or cabecero, made from select meat from the head of the pig).
      
Ernesto Soriano is the main cortador for Joselito. He is a motorcycle enthusiast with a shaved head, full beard and formidable tattoos on his arms. On his Facebook page, he posted a picture of himself that he labelled “súper chunga,” joking that he was a badass, but he is married with two young children he adores. When he is not on the circuit, his day job is cutting hams at Joselito’s Charcutería & Restaurante in Madrid.
        In early February 2018, I went to Joselito’s Veláquez store-restaurant to see if I could at least photograph a cortador cutting jamón Joselito. I got lucky, because Ernesto Soriano was at Joselito’s with his compañero cortador, David Alonso Martínez.
         When I asked Soriano (left) how he became a professional cortador de jamón, he told me, “I have been carving Ibérico hams for thirty years, the last five of which I have been lucky enough and privileged to be the Cortador Oficial for Joselito. Like a majority of cortadores, I began as an apprentice in a charcutería in a supermarket in the Madrid Barrio of Mortalaz. I never took a ham cutting course, I just observed how others carved hams, and I learned and evolved, constantly seeking to perfect my technique.”
         Soriano also echoed a refrain I heard from the other cortadores, “To be a successful professional cortador de jamón, you must have respect for the product, a lot of respect.  I believe the jamones are a product that is above us as ham cutters. Cortadores are the final link in the chain before a ham reaches the customer; therefore we have the responsibility to treat the ham with the affection it deserves. A lot of work has been done in the fields where the pigs are raised and the process—the salting, curing and drying in the cellar—requires a special skill before it reaches us. If we do not handle and carve the hams properly, we are disrespecting many people who do a very hard job of getting us the best possible product.”
        Soriano gave me a lesson in the tools that each cortador uses in the craft of carving fine jamones. Each cortador has a carrying case, like a matador with his sword case. Like Juanma Aguilar’s tool case, they are usually embossed with his name and calling card information.
         Soriano told me, “There are different knives, not just the classic long, thin-blade jamonero, or ham knife, that we use for much of the carving process. For opening a ham, I like to use a cuchillo de sierra, a serrated knife typically used to cut bread, to slice away the hard outer covering or rind of a ham. You have to be very careful to clean the blade, because the outer layer of the ham has bacteria we do not want on the slices of ham that we cut. We also use a small, very sharp and sharp-tipped boning knife called a puntilla that I use to marcar el hueso, or cut around the hip joint bone and the femur, so that each slice towards the bone comes away cleanly.”
         Some ham cutters, including Ernesto Soriano, prefer a Japanese alveolated jamonero knife, sometimes referred to as a cuchillo de salmon, a cured-salmon cutting knife that has notched hollows spaced the length of the blade, which allows the formation of air pockets that keep the slices from sticking to the blade.
         The remaining tools include a set of steel pincers to grip each slice as it is being cut and a small, pointed device made of wire sometimes used to burrow down alongside bones. In many kits, a steel chain-mail oyster-opener glove is sometimes used to protect the non-cutting hand from wounds from a wayward knife.
  Despite the importance of their artistry, as
The Ministro de Labor y Empleo does not yet recognize cortador as a real job.
José Ángel Muñoz laments, “Unfortunately, the profession of ham cutter does not yet officially exist. But little by little we will get the government to acknowledge that cutting ham is a legal employment classification.”

      After a brief tour of the curing rooms at Cinco Jotas Sánchez Carvajal in Jabugo (Huelva, Andalucía), Chef Ryan McIlwraith and Executive Chef Joel Ehrlich, whom I was leading on a Spanish gastronomy research tour in preparation for their opening of Bellota in San Francisco, joined me and Cinco Jotas official Cortador Severiano “Seve” Sánchez (right) in a dining room the firm uses to entertain guests. Sánchez gave us a seminar on ham cutting and showed us the differences in the distinct areas of a ham.  “If a jamón is really fine, the knife just glides through the meat and fat,” he said, “signifying that it comes from a pig that has had a good diet of acorns so the fat is well marbled into the meat. If the knife does not cut through the meat easily, that shows that the pig from which it came has not had a diet sufficiently high in acorns.”
        
Sánchez demonstrated that there are four distinctly flavored parts to each ham,  beginning with “la maza, the widest section of the ham with the greatest area of cured rind. Next he showed us la contramaza, which some sources claim is the same as the la babilla section of the ham, but is actually higher up on the leg, nearer the hip bone. La babilla is the thinner side of the ham with a lesser outer layer of fat, then there is la punta, the bottom part of the ham and finally el jarrete, the thin part of the leg that ends in the hoof. 
        
Sánchez
opened the outer layers of la maza and discarded them, saying,  “This outer layer protects the ham as it is aging and is a part of the curing process. It is bitter and not good to eat, so we do not want it to come in contact with the fresh-cut parts of the ham. The ideal temperature range for conserving a jamón should be between 14°C and 18°C (54°F and 64°F). The ideal temperature for consumption should be between 20°C and 24°C (68°F and 75°F).
        He sliced a fine layer of fat from the upper part of the maza, wrapped it around his finger and rubbed it to show us how the fat melts,  then how the maza slices are marbled. Next, he showed us the contramaza, below the maza. Because the hams hang from the hoof during the curing and drying process, it is somewhat more cured than la maza, so the slices come out smaller.
        In addition to the Maestros Cortadores, there are numerous other free-lancers like Juanma Aguilar (left), who has his own ham distribution business, Barrios, in Valencia. He showed us how he selects a ham and demonstrated how he tests the quality of the fat in a ham by inserting his index finger into it. “My finger is the temperature of my body,” he said. “Being a ham cutter has permitted me to know other European countries where many great people have taught me a lot. I would like to be dedicated just to cut hams like Florencio Sanchidrián, but, everyone has their own path. I have always had to run my ham and charcuterie business, so I do not always have the time to go away to ham cutting contests and food fairs, because the kilometers you have to travel and the expense can make an old man of you.”
       
Although being a cortador de jamón is a male-dominated profession, t
here are several women cortadoras de jamón, most notably up-and-comers Raquel Acosta and Silvia Andrada. Acosta is a have-cuchillo-will-travel ham artista, who freelances as Cortadora de Jamón Raquel Acosta Quintanilla and bills herself as a #haminfluencer, willing to journey nationally and internationally to “influence” hams for interested clients.  Andrada, who lives in Salamanca and won the Castilla y León ham cutting competition in 2017, works with Corte Fusión, a group of cortadores de jamón who offer their ham carving services.
 
      
A whole universe is distilled into a finished quality jamón Iberico and into a consummate ham cutter. All the tools and training, all the montanera, the acorns the pigs eat, the ham selection and curing process and the ham carver come together to provide to the uninitiated what seems to be the simple act of eating a slice of ham.  But, from a Maestro Cortador, a fine slice of jamón Iberico de bellota, though more easily encountered than a finely shaved white truffle perfuming a plate of pasta or a mound of Ossetra caviar on a mother of pearl spoon, is no less exquisite.

 





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CAPONE’S GOLD


By John Mariani 


CHAPTER FOUR


        So what have you got to show me?” asked David.
        “Okay,” Katie replied, opening the large folder with her notes.  “Let’s start with Capone’s motive.”
        David drew a breath, thinking he’d better humor the woman.
        “Good place to start.”
        “Why would Capone want to steal gold bullion?”
        “I assume because it was worth a lot of money,” said David, stifling a fake yawn.
        Katie frowned. “Didn’t Willie Sutton tell a reporter that the reason he robbed banks was because ‘that’s where the money is’?”
        “It was a great line,” said David, “But he never actually said it.”
        “Well, anyway,” said Katie, “remember that Capone stole the bullion after he was convicted.”
        “Okay.”
        “And remember that before going to trial for tax evasion he first tried to buy off the feds with an offer of four million bucks, but they wouldn’t take it because they wanted to shut him down and humiliate him as a mob boss.”
        “Yeah, he ended up paying much less in fines, court costs, and interest on his unpaid taxes, but he was put away while his friends and enemies took over his empire.”
        “Exactly,” said Katie, now smiling. “So here’s where it gets interesting. Capone must have known that his being sent to jail meant he was out of the business and no longer had any assets coming in.  He was too ruthless not to know his competitors would carve up his holdings in Chicago. They might even try to kill him in prison.”
        David put his chin in his hand. “Go on.”
        “So, unless he’d already hidden away a lot of money where the feds couldn’t get to it, whatever he had left legitimately would be gone before he would get out.  It was an eleven-year sentence.  He’d still be a young man but would have been out of power too long to start up again, at least in Chicago. He’d made a lot of enemies.”
        “I can only imagine,” said David, drawing himself another espresso. “You want one?”  
      
“No, thanks,” Katie replied. “Now, my question is, why steal gold bullion? You can’t sell it on the open market. You can’t fly it a brick at a time to Switzerland.”
        “Well, actually you could. They didn’t have metal detectors at the airports back then.”
        Katie was surprised that a top NYPD detective seemed so unintuitive, unless he was just playing Devil’s advocate with her.
        “Yes, but to check gold bricks a few at a time on an airline back in 1937 at the weight they are, it would raise suspicions. Plus, the airline might lose it, or the baggage handlers steal it. Too risky. And, if Capone were caught at it and they pinned it on him, he’d be right back in the slammer, this time for the rest of his life.”
        “So you’re suggesting he never saw the bullion as a way of refinancing himself when he got out of prison?”
        “Yes, no, and yes.”
        “Huh?”
        Katie placed her hands flat on the table. “You remember in the James Bond movie Goldfinger when Bond finds out that Auric Goldfinger—who was the actor who played him?”
          “Gert Frobe.”
          “Right.  Anyway, Bond finds out Goldfinger is melting down gold bullion and putting it into his Rolls Royce bodywork. Later on, Bond overhears Goldfinger discussing a plot—with Mafiosi!—about robbing Fort Knox and promises them tens of millions of dollars to help him.”
          “I’m listening,” said David, “though you do know that Goldfinger was a fictional character, don’t you?”
         Katie narrowed her eyes and smirked. “Just please listen.  After the Mafiosi obtain some nerve gas for Goldfinger, he kills them all with it.”
          “Another dumb move on his part.”
          “Hey, it’s part of the plot. So Bond tells Goldfinger his plan will never work, mostly because there would never be a way for him to drag the thousands of gold bricks out of Fort Knox before he’d be captured. Plus, it’s pretty impossible to break into the vault itself.  So Goldfinger just laughs at Bond and tells him he has no interest in stealing the gold.  Instead he’s going to detonate an atomic bomb in the vaults and render the gold useless for more than half a century.”
          “That’s right,” said David, “but I don’t remember why he wanted to do that.”
         “Because then the gold that Goldfinger had already hoarded away would increase in value exponentially, and, as I recall, wreak havoc on the world’s economy. And then there was something about how that would strengthen Red China’s clout.”
          “Okay, I remember that. So, uh, what has all that to do with Al Capone?”
          “Don’t you see?”
          “Humor me. I was only a detective for ten years.”
         “Well, Capone was a monomaniac who never thought anyone could bring him down.  But the feds did it with a ridiculous tax evasion case that they refused to allow him to plea bargain. Which must have made Capone go ballistic when he got convicted. So what does he do? With the power he still holds as a boss, he has a truck of gold bullion stolen—just to stick it to the feds and the I.R.S.  See, like Goldfinger, Capone wasn’t interested in the gold—at least not when he stole it. He was giving the finger to the feds and at the same time keeping that gold out of the market for at least the next decade. That’s a very long time for him to work out a plan to make use of it when he got out. Who knows, maybe he had it melted down into a Cadillac or something. And since the feds were unable to pin the heist on Capone, they couldn’t do anything more to him. Plus the statute of limitations would have kicked in.”
        David had to smile. “This all sounds ingenious but highly unlikely for two reasons.  One, assuming Capone lost enormous power with the crime families, they’d find some way to recover the gold. Guys would talk or be made to talk.  Second, even if it did survive in one spot, what could he do with it when he got out? Like you said, it would be difficult to ship the stuff anywhere.”
         Now Katie was smiling.  “Ah, have you so quickly forgotten Goldfinger’s plan?”
         “Enlighten me again about Mr. G?”
         “Goldfinger was using the bullion as a chip in a game with the feds.  And while he never did possess the Fort Knox gold, as time went on his own stores would become worth many, many millions—probably billions—more.
He was ransoming gold he didn’t even have.”
         David’s eyes started to widen. “Now, let me get this straight. Capone had the bullion but no access to it?”
         “Kind of like the exact opposite of Goldfinger.”      
 
       “Okay, so Capone sits on the gold while he’s doing his stretch, figuring that Hoover would never make a deal to free Pubic Enemy Number One, even if he returned the gold.  Then, when Capone does get out, since he can’t turn it into cash, he ransoms it with the feds?”
         “That’s it,” said Katie. “But first, after he serves his time like a good little convict—and assuming no one murders him in prison—the first thing he does is pack up and move abroad, probably Switzerland. Gets himself a nice villa on Lake Lugano. Maybe even learns to speak good Italian. Then, since the feds still can’t prove he had anything to do with the robbery, Capone tells the feds he knows where the gold is and demands the reward for the information—probably even more than they were offering. The feds have to pay the reward, and those dollars eventually find their way into Capone’s tidy Swiss bank account. So Mr. Al Capone is very rich again and untouchable because the Swiss will never deport him.”
         David was nodding now. “And if he let a few of his faithful, greedy mob friends in on the plan, they’ll make sure the bullion is securely hidden away where Capone’s enemies can’t find it.”
         “Exactly,” said Katie, resting her back on the chair and turning up her palms.
         David’s wheels were turning fast now. “Let me think this through. Capone keeps the gold hidden. The feds can’t pin it on Capone but they offer a reward right off the bat. No one comes to claim it, and it becomes part of the legend of Al Capone, once again sticking it to J. Edgar Hoover, Eliot Ness, the Treasury agents, and the I.R.S.  And when Al gets out—in his mid-forties—without admitting to the robbery, he collects the reward money. It was quite a plan. I got to hand it to him. And to you for figuring it out.”
         “Thanks,” said Katie, blinking sweetly.
         “Just one thing,” said David. “The plan never took hold. Capone was released early in a very sick, demented state, and he died a physical and mental wreck in his Florida mansion.”
         “Well, I’m sure he didn’t forget about the plan. He had so long to think about it. But it never seemed to go into action. The bullion is still out there somewhere, the feds still want it, there’s still a reward offered for it, and Capone isn’t speaking from the grave.”
         “Which, unfortunately, Katie, brings us back to square one. The gold is still lost.”
         “Yes, but if we’re right,” said Katie, “that means it’s still intact. Maybe in two or three places at most.”
         “True, the more places it was stored, the safer it would have been if someone squealed or was turned. The thing is, Katie, even if we don’t find the gold, you’ve got a great story that you probably don’t need my help on.”
         “But if I can’t prove the story, it’s still just a fairy tale and I can’t publish it. I need you and your detective skills and your contacts to help me find out if I’m right about this, and in so doing get closer to the gold.”
         “Or we end up like Geraldo Rivera. You know about that?”
         “Oh, yeah,” laughed Katie. “It was part of my research. Geraldo said he found evidence that Al Capone had a secret money vault in the Lexington Hotel, where he lived in Chicago, and there was supposedly a tunnel leading out of his medicine cabinet as a means of fast escape.”
         “Right, and other tunnels were said to connect to taverns and brothels he once ran.  So Geraldo, asshole that he is, arranged to host a TV special to open what looked like an underground vault.”
         “And when they broke through with hammers—nothing!”
         “Nothing but some empty bottles,” said David. “I think Geraldo did a little song and dance as he watched his career go up in smoke.”
         Katie winced. “Well, Detective Greco, let’s not have that happen to us, eh?”
         David Greco just smiled and said, “What am I getting myself into?”
         “Make that we.”

© John Mariani 2015

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 NOTES FROM THE WINE CELLAR


                    As Proseccos Sales Soar, Nino Franco Focuses

                                on High Quality Of Terroir

By John Mariani


 

         The enormous growth in popularity over the last decade in the global market is due as much to the taste of this Italian bubbly from the Veneto as to its generally low price. Prosecco now accounts for more than 20% of all sparkling wine sales. It makes a  good mixer with anything, especially Aperol as a spritz, has enough acid to go with appetizers, cheeses and not-too-sweet desserts, and there’s rarely any hype about it outside of the increasing recognition of better terroirs.

         One of the most respected producers in one of the most  respected terroirs, Valdobbiadene, was founded in 1919 by Antonio Franco and expanded and improved by his son Nino. At the beginning of the 1990s his son Primo sought to control every aspect of the planting, growing and harvesting through the fermentation, aging and bottling of his Prosecco. Today he is helped in his work by his wife Annalisa, who oversees their Villa Barberina B&B and his daughter Silvia, in production strategy and sales.

         I interviewed Primo as to the current state of Prosecco and of his current efforts to improve it.


Prosecco is now an enormous success in the global market, but Nino Franco, and 4 generations of your family, have been around since 1919. Can you tell me what prosecco was like in the past, before modern techniques like stainless steel?

Well, in the past Prosecco used to be a still white wine, sometimes bottle  fermented, with a short second fermentation in bottle, like the current  Prosecco “col fondo.” The second fermentation in stainless steel tank, the “autoclave,” started in the 1930s.

Was prosecco only drunk locally?

I would say mainly in the Veneto region, with a small quantity shipped in Italy and exported.

How important was the popularity of the Bellini cocktail to prosecco?

The Bellini Cocktail, created by the Ciprianis at Harry’s Bar in Venice, has been one of the ways to talk  about Prosecco.

You say that in 1982 you began to investigate how to make high quality wines and eliminate wines untypical of the area. Please explain.

I always said that my grandfather started as a “commerciante/négoçiant,” and we are still proudly a négoçiant family. In that time we were producing and bottling white and red  wine and sparkling Prosecco, then I decided to focus only on high quality sparkling Prosecco.
 
You say that starting in 1999 you focused on “tiny plots” for their terroir and the “dolomite rosa” soil. How does this differ from the soil of lesser areas?

In 1999 I started using the grapes from the Vigneto della Riva di San Floriano as a single vineyard, and the first bottling as a single vineyard was with the 2000 harvest. The Riva di San Floriano is a hill that looks like a headland facing east towards Valdobbiadene.  The soil is dolomitic with some pink outcrop. The soil is very poor, but between the layers of stone and the fertile soil the vine roots draw nourishment and they go in depth.  It is a very particular terroir that makes the wine different.

 

You have 100-year-old vines in Nodi. Have you used different clones to improve the health of the vines and their quality?
 
The Col del Vent vineyard from where we get the Nodi grapes is again a very special place—a thousand meters as the crow flies from the Riva di San Floriano. Here we find a completely different soil: 100% clay, very deep and with a heritage of very old vines with old glera clones and old rootstock. We are taking a lot of special care to save these vines, and also in reproducing either vines or rootstock to keep the diversity of the vineyard.
 
There is, unfortunately, a lot of poor quality prosecco in the market, yet the region has a DOCG. How is this possible, especially since the production of prosecco is huge and grows more so every year?

The Prosecco DOC appellation is quite large, and, as in many large appellations, you can find a large number of wines of average quality.The Valdobbiadene Conegliano Prosecco Superiore DOCG  belongs to the historic area, the one that is now a UNESCO Heritage site, and in this area you can find a tremendous variety of landscape, hills, steepness and  exposures that make the wine unique.

Do you use the Charmat method? If so, why is this better than the Champagne method?

Glera is a semi-aromatic grape, and the méthode Charmat is the best way to keep the flavor and the perfume of the grape in the bottle. The answer  to if it is better or not is that this one is the method traditionally used in Italy to make sparkling wines from aromatic grapes. 

The vineyard land in Valdobbiadene has gotten very expensive. Is there still more land available to purchase?

To tell the truth, I don’t believe it, because at the moment the planting of new vineyards is not allowed .
 
Tell me about Villa Barberina (above and right).

Ah, Villa Barberina is a magic place! A two-hundred-year old villa , surrounded by the Grave di Stecca estate, converted to a five-bedroom B&B, with a double pool. In one word: a dream.

 

 




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BOOKS WE NEVER
STARTED READING

"Essentially the whole book is figuring out why I cry in this grocery store."—Michelle Zauner, author of Crying in H Mart quoted in Eater.com.

 










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Sponsored by






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Modesty forbids me to praise my own new book, but let me proudly say that it is an extensive revision of the 4th edition that appeared more than a decade ago, before locavores, molecular cuisine, modernist cuisine, the Food Network and so much more, now included. Word origins have been completely updated, as have per capita consumption and production stats. Most important, for the first time since publication in the 1980s, the book includes more than 100 biographies of Americans who have changed the way we cook, eat and drink -- from Fannie Farmer and Julia Child to Robert Mondavi and Thomas Keller.


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"Much needed in any kitchen library."--Bon Appetit.




Now in Paperback, too--How Italian Food Conquered the World (Palgrave Macmillan)  has won top prize  from the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards.  It is a rollicking history of the food culture of Italy and its ravenous embrace in the 21st century by the entire world. From ancient Rome to la dolce vita of post-war Italy, from Italian immigrant cooks to celebrity chefs, from pizzerias to high-class ristoranti, this chronicle of a culinary diaspora is as much about the world's changing tastes, prejudices,  and dietary fads as about our obsessions with culinary fashion and style.--John Mariani

"Eating Italian will never be the same after reading John Mariani's entertaining and savory gastronomical history of the cuisine of Italy and how it won over appetites worldwide. . . . This book is such a tasteful narrative that it will literally make you hungry for Italian food and arouse your appetite for gastronomical history."--Don Oldenburg, USA Today. 

"Italian restaurants--some good, some glitzy--far outnumber their French rivals.  Many of these establishments are zestfully described in How Italian Food Conquered the World, an entertaining and fact-filled chronicle by food-and-wine correspondent John F. Mariani."--Aram Bakshian Jr., Wall Street Journal.


"Mariani admirably dishes out the story of Italy’s remarkable global ascent to virtual culinary hegemony....Like a chef gladly divulging a cherished family recipe, Mariani’s book reveals the secret sauce about how Italy’s cuisine put gusto in gusto!"--David Lincoln Ross, thedailybeast.com

"Equal parts history, sociology, gastronomy, and just plain fun, How Italian Food Conquered the World tells the captivating and delicious story of the (let's face it) everybody's favorite cuisine with clarity, verve and more than one surprise."--Colman Andrews, editorial director of The Daily Meal.com.

"A fantastic and fascinating read, covering everything from the influence of Venice's spice trade to the impact of Italian immigrants in America and the evolution of alta cucina. This book will serve as a terrific resource to anyone interested in the real story of Italian food."--Mary Ann Esposito, host of PBS-TV's Ciao Italia.

"John Mariani has written the definitive history of how Italians won their way into our hearts, minds, and stomachs.  It's a story of pleasure over pomp and taste over technique."--Danny Meyer, owner of NYC restaurants Union Square Cafe,  The Modern, and Maialino.

                                                                             






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FEATURED LINKS: I am happy to  report that the Virtual Gourmet is  linked to four excellent travel sites:

Everett Potter's Travel  Report

I consider this the best and savviest blog of its kind on the  web. Potter is a columnist for USA Weekend, Diversion, Laptop and Luxury  Spa Finder, a contributing editor for Ski and  a frequent contributor to National  Geographic Traveler, ForbesTraveler.com  and Elle Decor. "I’ve designed this site is for people who take their  travel seriously," says Potter. "For travelers who want to learn about special  places but don’t necessarily want to pay through the nose for the privilege of  staying there. Because at the end of the day, it’s not so much about five-star  places as five-star experiences."  THIS WEEK:






Eating Las Vegas JOHN CURTAS has been covering the Las Vegas food and restaurant scene since 1995. He is the co-author of EATING LAS VEGAS – The 50 Essential Restaurants (as well as the author of the Eating Las Vegas web site: www.eatinglasvegas. He can also be seen every Friday morning as the “resident foodie” for Wake Up With the Wagners on KSNV TV (NBC) Channel 3  in Las Vegas.



              



MARIANI'S VIRTUAL GOURMET NEWSLETTER is published weekly.  Publisher: John Mariani. Editor: Walter Bagley. Contributing Writers: Christopher Mariani, Robert Mariani,  Misha Mariani, John A. Curtas, Gerry Dawes, Geoff Kalish, and Brian Freedman. Contributing Photographer: Galina Dargery. Technical Advisor: Gerry McLoughlin.

 

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