Five years of interviews, filming, and recording the grannies produced this cookbook-documentary that transports you to the Abruzzo mountains, the Sardinian seaside, and the hardscrabble land of Basilicata, among others. The Introduction focuses on making egg and durum wheat pasta, offers tools and how-to photos. The biographical sketches set the stage and introduce you to the nonne, their families and their homes. The eight chapters, from nuts and herbs to ravioli and tortelli show the diversity of pasta and its foundation to Italian home cooking. What makes this cookbook a standout are the images. Here you find the nonne in everyday dress, sitting along a balcony, making pasta with a granddaughter, tables set with homespun colorful tablecloths, and photo after photo of gnarly fingers and skilled hands that make dishes of pasta for family and friends.
Growing up with Italian women who look, act, and cook like those in Pasta Grannies, I feel more at home and less intimidated to try the recipes. American Sfoglino looks and feels more upmarket, as though the professional chef at Felix Trattoria in Los Angeles is looking over my shoulder and I dare not make a mistake.
The marketing for both books reflects the times, and during the Pandemic are welcomed additions: via articles in print, YouTube, their Instagram feeds and respective websites. Tune in to their YouTube videos and the difference in style becomes apparent immediately. Pasta Grannies transports you into everyday kitchens, the nonne speak Italian while walking you through the recipe. Evan Funke takes you to his chef kitchen
These two books offer the home cook a primer on pasta-making, but more importantly, they continue the story arc of food as cultural, emotional, and communal; memorialize the tradition of hand-made pasta making; and introduce us to a wealth of culinary knowledge and technique that needs to be passed from generation to generation.
Nancy worked with the recipes in both books. You will learn and you will gradually head toward the perfection you see in the detailed photos and text of Evan Funke’s book. It is a bit like the old joke of how you get to Carnegie Hall – practice, practice, practice. My spinach tortelloni came out well after about three or four tries. My farfalle, not so much, more like flattened moths, but I persist. His recipes and techniques are solid.
Pasta Grannies recipes in the book benefit from watching the videos. Instructions and ingredient amounts are a bit shaky. My slavish following of one had to be discarded. Another, with adjustments made after watching the video and tweaking the recipe, worked out a lot better. Still, the variety of sauces and pastas, while the details are blurred, are a cure for pandemic blues.
Liz DiGregorio, newest Cuisinette, retired from a career in emergency management. She bought Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking in 1967 and has been cooking ever since. Her love of Italian food is rooted in her DNA. When not re-arranging her cookbook library, she can be found in the garden, English mystery in hand and plotting her next escape from DC.
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