Italy is, quite simply, the greatest food country in the world — and that is not a controversial opinion but a statement of fact that is backed up by the extraordinary quality, diversity, and passion for ingredients and technique that you encounter everywhere you go in this remarkable country. Italian cuisine is not one thing but many things — each region, each city, each village has its own distinct culinary traditions, its own local specialties, its own version of pasta or bread or cheese or cured meat that it is fiercely proud of and that it has been perfecting for generations. In Bologna, the self-proclaimed food capital of Italy, you will find the world’s finest tagliatelle al ragù — a slow-cooked meat sauce served on hand-rolled egg pasta that bears absolutely no resemblance to what the rest of the world calls bolognese. In Naples, the birthplace of pizza, you will eat the real thing for the first time — a simple, blistered, perfectly charred disc of dough topped with San Marzano tomatoes and buffalo mozzarella that makes every pizza you have eaten before seem like a pale imitation. In Sicily, the food carries the influences of Arab, Norman, and Spanish cultures that shaped the island’s history — arancini, caponata, fresh pasta with sardines and wild fennel, and the most extraordinary cannoli and granita you have ever tasted. And in Rome, the simple perfection of cacio e pepe — just pasta, pecorino cheese, and black pepper — demonstrates better than almost anything else that Italian cooking at its greatest is not about complexity but about the absolute quality of a very few exceptional ingredients.
