What IS it about italian food?

[ptumbi]

I've just read another article from a well-known chef who is spouting one of the wonders of the known world that is Italian food. I get it, it's (supposed to be) healthy and lovely and full of sunshine and goodness...

BUT - is it? I Low-carb, and don't eat pasta, bread, pizza. In fact, when cooking for my young kids, I realised that pasta is generally flour and water pap. Mixed with oil, or cream, or meat sauces. It is that 'golden' ratio of carbs and fat that our bodies look for (hence doughnuts, cheese sandwiches etc being so delicious) but it's not actually very good for you!

This Chef was invited (of course) to an authentic 3-course lunch at an authentic rural family's smallholding, and fed in the sunshine surrounded by screaming happy children running about. Idyllic, yes? And of course there was the obligatory 'nonna' sitting next to her, smiling and making 'mmmm' noises.

I went to Naples last year, looking forward to the food (I don't low-carb on holiday). I had an 'authentic' Neapolitan Pizza which was basically a hard base, covered in watery tomato goop, and with a few Basil leaves chucked on top. Yummy. Not.

Everywhere we ate, the food was bog-standard - in fact we get better 'Italian' in the UK.

'Italian' food is vastly overrated. IMHO.

I can recommend this book if anyone wants to have a go at some gorgeous Italian vegetable dishes.

lots of low-carb options

What a weird thing to rant about.

Ok we get it, you don't appreciate la cucina povera but come on, pasta and gnocchi are in no way flour and water pap/stodge. Most fresh pasta has egg in it and freshly made gnocchi with sage butter as a first course is lovely. And as a first course it's not going to be huge.
And proper gelato (which is not eaten every day) is a lot more than frozen cream and sugar. Have you cooked these things for yourself?

So, in your opinion, which is the best country for food?

I’m in Italy and living a low carb pre-diabetic lifestyle.
It’s perfectly doable because of all the wonderful variety of fresh vegetables, cheeses, meat and fish.
But carbs are a (sometimes twice) daily event with a seemingly endless round of dry pasta, egg pasta, pizza, rice, bread, gnocchi, focaccia. Plus occasional potatoes!
A person who is aware of and sticks to a low carb lifestyle would see Italian food as one long carb fest...

But I can honestly say I never get bored or feel at a disadvantage. I substitute sautéed courgettes or grilled aubergines for pasta and eat the same sauce as everybody else. My version of Melanzane alla Parmigiana is low carb but certainly not low calorie. Chickpea farinata instead of pizza is well tasty if you work your diet around it for the day.

But desserts are a big problem. Flour, butter and sugar used to extremes. From biscuits, sticky doughnuts and croissants at breakfast, through ice cream or homemade jam tart mid afternoon, to fruit flans and dainty pastries on a Sunday, I just have to say No.

People look at me as if I’m mad but I argue that:
I am a food fan but I have enough experience of food to remember what good bread tastes like, and to know what satisfaction a plateful of pasta can give.
The health benefits of living low carb are undeniable FOR ME. So undeniable that I can forego pizza, pasta and all the rest.

sgtmajor - great post! I substitute a lot of vegetables for wheat/carb-based dishes, and don't feel deprived. And the health benefits for me are also undeniable.

This thread was not meant to be 'how to low-carb in Italy (or anywhere)' but more 'I am sick to the back teeth of TV chefs telling everyone how wonderful Italian food is', as if food elsewhere is rubbish. When Italian food can be boring, bland, stodgy, cheap and rubbish,same as anywhere. OK - it can be wonderful. It can be just as wonderful cooked over a BBQ in South Africa.

So, in your opinion, which is the best country for food? - well, this is the point. No country has the best food. It might have the best tomatoes, or the best lamb, or the best whatever-ingredient, but no country has the 'best food', and it is stupid to think otherwise. If you think that Italy has the best food, and you go there and in fact the food is crap, it's not helpful.

NO country 'has the best food' and it is disingenuous of TV chefs or anyone to tell us it does. Especially over decades and decades.... Maybe they could stop pushing ' cheap white carbs with sauce' and start showing us how to use better protein and veg in more imaginative ways? Rather than chuck a plate of flour and water pasta with tinned tomatoes, maybe tasty ways with broccoli? Or carrots? Local, seasonal veg and good meat, locally sourced - not imported? Just a thought.

You know, I remember back in the day when a thread would get people discussing, a bit of a debate going. Nowadays it seems full of posts saying 'you sound deranged' or 'you sound not very nice' (and no other input) and 'what a strange thing to rant about' as if there is a set of parameters for ranting! If you don't understand the discussion, or it's not for you, head somewhere else. To just post 'you sound deranged' says more about you than me.

I sort of get where you are coming from. I feel, quietly, the same way about French food....

I like France and have eaten v v well there and the raw ingredients are amazing. But it does get a little samey....

I have eaten spectacularly well in Italy too. The best pizza of my life in Naples. Buffalo mozzarella.

But also eaten carbs crsp. And I love a good carb!

Most countries have fab ingredients that on the hands of a good cook are sublime.

Except Germany.

Pizza, pasta and carbs in general are not bad for you, that is just a modern fad in the Western World.

Good quality pasta and pizza indeed hits that golden ratio of fat and carbs, which makes it so satisfying to eat (which means you won't be reaching for crappy snacks an hour later)

Also, Italian food is so much more than pizza and pasta

The healthy diet being pushed is the Mediterranean diet - which is high fibre, loads of fruit and veg, lots of oily fish, olive oil, not so much carbs.

So not really Italian as it's come over to Britain as masses of pasta, pizza and risotto. Although I love all those things and wonder where you were eating in Italy to find them average - I have eaten bad food in Italy at touristy restaurants and amazing food at places geared more to Italians.

Personally I find it easier to eat in a low carb Mediterranean way with Greek, Moroccan, Lebanese or Turkish food but I suspect that is just how recipes are presented, we get given what we want and we have grown to ignore all the veg dishes from Italy.

When eaten correctly in moderation (pasta is a starter) and followed with the rest of their diet (seafood and fish, lots of fresh vegetables) then it can be healthy and full of good fats and nutrients.

The Italian food I had in Florence was incredible btw, sounds like you went to crappy restaurants

It seems odd to think the quality of debate on MN has declined because people are failing to agree with you.

I've never seen a TV chef say that Italy has "the best" food. Saying that Italian food is their favourite or that Italian food is wonderful, sure, but most chefs know that food is too subjective to make a sweeping generalisation like that.

carbs are not evil.

spaghetti, bread etc are not 'just' carbs, they contain a good amount of protein too.

italian food generally is veg heavy. if you go to a proper restaurant you will get salad-pasta-main (fish or meat&veg)-fruit&coffee

God, you sound tedious OP....

OK fine, we all bow down to your superior foodie knowledge and size 10 low carbing ways, Italian food is shit and anyone who likes it is stoooooopid. Happy now?

I stop reading whenever I hit the word “carb”.

Food bores are tedious in the extreme.

I don't think TV chefs are always pushing Italian. I think there is a far greater trend now for Indian, East Asian, Thai or Caribbean.

I think Italian food is absolutely delicious personally and I've always eaten amazingly when I went. I've actually never had a pizza in Italy! Always meat, fish, pasta, salads. I think the point is that Italian and Mediterranean food celebrate good produce cooked simply. This means it's relatively easy for people to feel that they can cook the recipes at home as there might only be 5 ingredients - meaning it encourages home cooks.

I spent Easter half term in Sicily and the food was amazing. Beautiful seafood, salads, many aubergine based dishes, fruit granitas - and yes, pasta. But smaller portions of perfectly cooked pasta with light sauces.

As pp have said, there's nothing 'evil' about carbs.

Who actually says Italian food is the best in the world? Nobody does here in France and they are our neighbours

You can say food from a particular country is good.
It doesn’t mean you think other food is bad.

It’s like saying “I love ice cream”. It doesn’t mean I think other desserts are shit, I just love ice cream.

And it depends on where in Italy. I don't particularly like the Italian dishes where I live!

We loved the food in Tuscany. We were a bit more choosy in the Veneto and in the Val d' Aosta we often resorted to curry. Looking forward to Bologna on the next trip!

I have heard tv chefs rave about italian food. I have also heard them rave about french, Greek, Indian, Thai, Chinese, Sri Lankan, etc etc etc food. There are some countries where no one seems to rave - I've never heard anyone say that, say, Hungarian food is the world's best - but it really isn't all reserved for Italy. I honestly don't know why you have such a bee in your bonnet about it.

Italian food is dominant in foreign food cookery programmes in the UK probably because of the cuisine's popularity. It's obviously not the only cuisine that is fabulous- other countries such as Spain and Japan have fabulous home grown ingredients that can be turned into heathy dishes. It's probably a ratings thing- a programme introducing people to a more niche cuisine from a UK perspective like Russia may not get the viewers and recoup costs/sell cookbooks.

Carbs are not necessarily unhealthy. In Japan people eat lots of rice and noodles yet are super slim and live longer than UK average but you know what works for your body.

I think that in the case of Italian food, there are places in other countries that replicate it to a very high standard. I have visited Italy and while the salads were tasty, I found the pizzas extremely similar to places that I'd eaten in other countries. I've lived in Japan so when it comes to amazing seafood, I've had lots of experience.

I feel like we’ve glossed over the use of “low-carb” as a verb...
Also, if you’re so incredibly disappointed with Italian food, I can’t help but wonder why you continue to “travel extensively” through Italy.