Cucina del Sole or Swedish Christmas

Cucina del Sole: A Celebration of Southern Italian Cooking

Author: Nancy Harmon Jenkins

Nancy Harmon Jenkins has lived in Italy for fifteen years and describes this wonderful region from Naples to the toe of Italy that is still unspoiled by tourism with its own rich culinary traditions quite different from Tuscany and Northern Italy. In addition to a wealth of recipes, the book gives capsule portraits of local features: a fish market, an olive oil press, a bakery, a shepherd cheese–maker. Headnotes describe local folklore and traditions and what makes the food of Southern Italy a world on its own. Included are recipes for focaccias, pizzas and savory pies; soups and minestre; sauces for pasta; pasta, beans, rice, and other grains; fish and seafood; meat and poultry; vegetables; salads; and desserts.

Publishers Weekly

In her previous cookbooks, which include Flavors of Tuscanyand Flavors of Puglia, Jenkins distinguished herself with a no-nonsense and informative approach. She employs the same tone in her latest effort, which offers recipes from the regions of Campania, Calabria, Basilicata, Puglia and Sicily. As the author explains, these regions, called the Mezzogiorno, boast a vibrant and varied cuisine. Indeed, the only criticism that might be levied here is that each of the five regions could support a cookbook of its own rather than being lumped into one. Poverty appears to have been the mother of invention in Southern Italy: Jenkins provides several versions of pancotto, basically soup stretched with leftover bread. She also points up the much less frequent use of meat and the prevalence of vegetable stews such as Basilicata's Ciaudedda o Stufato di Verdure with artichokes and fava beans. Jenkins is frank about the difficulty of finding some ingredients in the U.S.: the recipe for Sicily's classic Pasta Colle Sarde acknowledges that its wild fennel is both irreplaceable and hard to track down. A chapter on travel to Southern Italy rounds out this pragmatic volume about an area that Americans are just beginning to explore in large numbers. (Mar.)

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Judith Sutton - Library Journal

Jenkins, author of the impressive Essential Mediterranean, wrote about one region of southern Italy in an earlier title, Flavors of Puglia. Here, she expands her focus to the area known as the Mezzogiorno, which encompasses Campania, Calabria, Basilicata, and Sicily, as well as Puglia. Traditionally one of the poorest parts of Italy, it is enjoying increasing prosperity and the emergence of more affluent eaters. Exploring the traditional and contemporary "foods and foodways" of these five closely related regions, Jenkins provides recipes from home cooks and restaurant chefs alike set in a historical context that stretches from the early Greek voyageurs through Arab occupation to modern times. Her text is highly readable and informative, and many of the recipes will be unfamiliar even to fans of Italian food. Highly recommended.

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Swedish Christmas

Author: Catarina Lundgren Astrom

Swedish Christmas is not just a cookbook but an inspiring book full of Christmas memories, recipes and tips of how to make Christmas enchanting. With its atmospheric photographs and engaging stories, it can be used as the ultimate handbook to a magical Christmas or simply be enjoyed as an armchair book. All the recipes have been adapted to the American kitchen.