Receta On Authenticity

by Frank Fariello

Welcome to our three part beginner’s guide to authentic Italian food! Here’s what you’ll find here:

This post walks you through the principal types of Italian cooking you are likely to encounter from true Italian food, the kind they make in Italy, to Italian Diaspora cooking, which at its best has an authenticity all its own, to the more dubious ‘Italian-style’ cooking and just plain bad imitations.

Part II: Learning to Tell Real Italian Food from Fake

This post gives you some pointers on where to go to learn about authentic Italian food, from the best books and online sources to TV shows, and lists some of the most common tell-tales signs of fakery.

Part III: How to Cook Authentic Italian Food at Home

This posts gives you the skinny on how to recreate authentic Italian dishes at home. It’s much easier than you think, so long as you keep some basic pointers in mind. The post runs down how to choose and work with ingredients for authentic flavors, and how to develop authentic cooking techniques. To get the most out of this post, read it in conjunction with our pages on The Italian Pantry and Italian Food Culture.

Once you’ve been through these posts, I can guarantee that you will have a very good idea of what it takes to cook and eat authentic Italian food—the way it was meant to be enjoyed.

Buon appetito and happy cooking!