Mangia, Little Italy!: Secrets from a Sicilian Family Kitchen

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Summary: Finally Grandma's Italian Cooking is Back
Review: After so many copies of Italian books that I've thrown out, this one works. It was recommended to me by several professional cooking teachers. I made the Cassata cake, the mother or all Sicilian cakes, and it was fantasik. Romina's 7-Hour Sunday Sauce is the best I've ever made. The family went crazy with the results. I even found pizzas here I have only heard about, such as "Sicilian Christmas Pizzas" stuffed with pork and spinach, and Salted Sardine pizzas. These recipes are impossible to find, and they all worked. I also made her Lemon Cakes which has that homemade taste in the crust topped with cinnamon that I remember Grandma making. This is a book you can read for folktales or cook with. That is rare. I particularly loved the author's tips called "Secrets of Success" on the side of the pages, it helps to make cooking easier. So if you want to make an authentic Lasanga the way it was at the turn of the century or a real Sicilian pizza, the way it's made in Sicily, this is the only book that I've found that is the real thing. Bravo Francesca Romina!

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Summary: Best Sicilian Cookbook I've Seen
Review: Great book. Great read. Just love the stories and folklore from Sicily. This the food my grandmother made and I never could find the recipes. Well, they are in this book. The sauces, pizzas, fritattas are great. Francesca Romina just won the contest in Newsday for the best Sesame Seed (Regina) biscuits in Mangia Little Itay. They were terrific and easy to make. There are recipes in this book that I have never seen before and great hints and tips along the way. The author seems to go to great lenghts to be specific for her readers. These recipes work and are well tested. I'm buying several copies for my family members.

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Summary: I can taste the food just like MY mother made!
Review: Hi, I'm Francesca and writing Mangia, Little Italy! was quite a feat, because I had to deal with my grandma Josephina who didn't want her recipes revealed. To me, she's the best cook and storyteller in the world. Each chapter of my book begins with how food was bought and made in Sicily 100 years ago today, and how it was bought and made when Grandma arrived in New York's Little Italy in 1922. For example, I explain that the first ices were only made in the winter in Sicly when snow was available, by pouring fruit syrups over them, and ice cream was only available at the local pastry store -- these foods were never made in the home, since there was no refrigeration. In Little Italy, the first snow fall was anxiously awaited so children could once again collect snow off the firescape and make ices. Now this is known as snow cones... there's some history for you. I also included wonderful tales from the past, such as The Curse of the Woman in the Red Dress, and Chickens that Turn into Gold, a wonderful fairytale that is still believed. If you'd like to know the history of lasanga, and it's original name, and make dishes like Lasagna with a 7-Hour Meat Tomato Sauce, you'll enjoy my book. The old days of Little Italy will hopefully come alive for you. Francesca Romina

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Summary: You Can Do Better
Review: Mangia, Little Italy! by Francesca Romina is one of the many Sicilian and Italian-American cookbooks I've tried. Due to the effort and cost associated with preparing good food today, I found this cookbook not worth keeping. I read through several of Francesca's recipes, and found not only were they incorrect but the background information associated with them was grossly inaccurate. Let me share two examples with you: The recipe for The Mother of all Sicilian desserts, the Cassata, on page 263, references the cake as "more than 500 years old" and gives readers some corny story about a wealthy man who wanted a cake with "cannoli" cream, hence the "invention" of the Sicilian Cassata. If the authors of this book had actually checked with food historians, they would know that the Cassata celebrated its 1000th birthday last year (1999), and is a product of the Arab influence on the island, not some wealthy man who wanted variety. But that aside, the recipe given in this book calls for Rum liquor to be added to the sponge cake, which is not correct. In order to make a traditional Cassata the liquor which is dribbled on the sponge cake is a Grand Marnier mixture, a decidedly more pleasant and very different flavor than rum. The second example of dooming readers and cooks to failure is if one was to follow the "Secrets of Success" information for eggplant parmesan, found on page 227. Romina tells her readers NOT to drain and salt the eggplant before battering and cooking, a sure recipe for a soggy end result. I've never met a "dry" eggplant, and the oil and water which needs to be drained from the salted slices for at least 2 hours before further preparation is acidic. The other problem with this recipe is that it explains to people how to fry the eggplant, but not that to BAKE it is a low fat, far less greasy alternative. Also, if the eggplant is baked, you won't need to drain the oil out overnight as Romina suggests. My last gripe with this cookbook is that there are no photographs of the finished product, which in Italian cooking is incredibly important. The presentation and decoration of the dish lends credibility to it's authenticity, and assists the chef in preparing it properly, since many people could interpret the recipes in different manners if not shown how the author means for the dish to be assembled. The books I highly recommend to those who are seriously interested in becoming better Sicilian and Italian-American cooks are The Heart of Sicily by Anna Tasca Lanza (Clarkson Potter Publishers, New York, 1993) and Italian Immigrant Cooking by Elodia Rigante (First View Books, Cobb, California, 1995). The recipes are easy to follow without sacrificing authentic ingredients for ease of preparation. When you make something from one of these cookbooks, you will be pleased with the result and your family and friends will applaud your culinary genius. Your time, effort, and money will not be wasted.

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Summary: A Book you'll use over and over!
Review: The recepies in this book remind me of all the wonderful dishes that my Grandma used to make. I have found the pizza dough recepie tastes very close to my Sicilian Great Grandmother's pizza dough. I tend to agree that Italians keep these spicial recepies to themselves which unfortunatly die with the generations. This book brings them all back to life along with the wonderful stories and pictures that go along with them. I'm purchasing another copy for my father, who loved mine so much! I just couldn't part with it!

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Summary: This is true Sicilian cooking!
Review: This book gives excellent recipes for true Sicilian cooking...the best cooking style of Italy. If you enjoy simple old-time dishes, this book is for you.

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Summary: Excellent book! Worth it for the sauce recipe alone!
Review: This book was excellent. Any Italian cookbook with Aglio Olio in it (pasta in garlic oil with cheese) has got to be OK! This was a favorite dish of mine while growing up. The tomato sauce recipes were worth the price of the book alone! The author is a skilled writer in spite of what one reviewer said. I found the stories entertaining and interesting. And the recipes were as authentic as any my Sicilian mother or aunts had ever prepared. I love this book!