Food & Wine

Italian food is regional before it is national, seasonal before it is traditional, and always specific. The ribollita in Siena is not the ribollita in Florence. The way they make cacio e pepe in Testaccio is not the way a Roman restaurant in London makes cacio e pepe. The Nebbiolo grape produces one wine in the Langhe and a different wine entirely forty kilometres north in Valtellina, and the differences are not subtle. This section takes Italian food and wine seriously enough to be precise about all of that.Recipes are given with the context that makes them make sense. Wine articles go beyond the label to the soil and the person. Restaurant pieces are written after eating, not after reading a press release. If you want to understand Italian food and Italian wine — not just consume them — this is where to begin.