Last week's San Francisco Chronicle Food section reviewed new Italian cookbooks by Faith Heller Willinger and Nancy Harmon Jenkins.

Willinger's sounds the most appealing to me - "Adventures of an Italian Food Lover ... With recipes from 254 of My Very Best Friends."

quote:

The book has brief profiles of cooks, producers and vendors of everything from artisanal balsamic vinegar to cookies and strawberries sold with the stem and leaves left intact. Willinger has a folksy style when she tells you what wines to drink, where to shop, or eat, or just sightsee to widen your Italian culinary horizons.

Jenkins' "Cucina del Sole: a Celebration of Southern Italian Cooking" also looks good, though - it focuses on the cooking of Sicily, Calabria, Basilicata, Puglia and Campania.

quote:

These regions are far less traveled by American tourists than the Toscana and neighboring northern regions, so the cuisine of the south is far less familiar - which is a shame, Jenkins easily convinces us.

The article includes a recipe for "Spaghettini with Swordfish Ragu" from Willinger's book, and "Lemon & Garlic Chicken" from Jenkins'. ... I guess I need to check them both out at the bookstore!

I agree with the idea that southern Italian cookery is worth looking into. I went to Puglia to check out my own take on Pugliese and discovered dishes I'd never heard of. The food was just wonderful. Unless I saw the book I wouldn't know how thorough it was, but what struck me in Puglia was that when I read about their food, the reading is always concentrated on feast foods-- the heavier and richer dishes. I felt the everyday ordinary food was even better.

Faith's book is quite well reviewed on amazon.ca. I was actually looking at buying it last evening . . .