True or false: 5 myths about Italian cuisine

Italian cuisine is renowned for its quality and is loved around the world - but what if its supposedly centuries-old tradition is just an invention of the past 50 years? At least that's what the economic historian Alberto Grandi claims. We got to the bottom of his outrageous theories.

CHAPTERS
00:00 Intro
01:05 Pizza
02:07 Spaghetti Carbonara
03:07 Olive oil
03:51 Parmesan cheese
04:36 Italian grandmas
05:13 Outro

CREDITS
Report: Lina Wölfel, Michael Kadereit
Camera: Susanne Gessner
Edit: Jennifer Gärtner
Supervising editors: Mirja Viehweger, Ruben Kalus

#dweuromaxx #italianfood #italy

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[andreabartsch]

There was not such a thing as a unique Italian cusine.
My grandma from the Po plains used pork fat even for frying suites, while in southern Italy olive oil use dates back to the ancient Greek colonies.

[qkwnwkw]

Reality check: If you tell an Italian Grandma she can't cook. She'll beat you within an inch of your life.

[fnsr]

As an Italian, I can say that Italian cuisine is full of myths and misconceptions, but it's so obvious that Grandi is just talking nonsense and probably just wants attention. It's clear that he's being intellectually dishonest. When someone talks about "Italian" culinary habits while completely ignoring the country's regional diversity, it already shows how low the quality of their historical analysis is. Saying things like "olive oil wasn't widely used in Italy before the 1980s" is ridiculou, WHERE in Italy? Are you talking about Piedmont or Puglia? There is a HUGE difference between those. My grandfather, born in southern Italy in 1905, had his own olive mill, and olive oil was always an essential part of his life. Maybe in Piedmont, they used butter or animal fats more, but to make sweeping statements like that is absurd.

Then there's the claim that "pizza arrived in America first." My grandmother, from the province of Avellino (near Naples), was making pizza in her wood-fired oven every week in the 1930s, and it was a sacred dish for her. Maybe pizza became popular in New York before it did in Turin since many southern itlians went there before, but that doesn't mean it's more American. Pizza has been a staple in southern Italy for ages. Also nobody claims PIZZA as an WHOLE ITALY national dish, everybody knows it's droma Naples and the south.
As for the carbonara, it’s so laughable what he affirms. Grandi plays the expert food historian and then makes claims without any historical evidence.

What does he even mean by saying that carbonara ingredients aren’t part of Italian cuisine? Pasta, cheese (a staple in Italian gastronomy for centuries), and cured meats (whether pancetta or guanciale—Italians have always consumed tons of cured meats), along with eggs and pepper, aren’t "Italian" ingredients? It's like he's ignoring parallel recipes like Amatriciana or Gricia. And the idea that we need to pinpoint the origin of a simple dish like carbonara is absurd. It could have evolved in countless ways across different cities, towns, or even families. Do we really need Americans to enlighten us with the concept of adding eggs to pasta?

Everything this clown says isn't just false, it’s completely senseless and proves nothing at all.

[TeddyAura]

If Italian food becomes world heritage multinationals like Heinz, Nestle, etc will have to pay royalties for using Italian names in their products. That is why there is an increasing interest to attack Italian candidacy

[adolci]

This man is mixing some true facts with a lot of fakes.

[grand]

The same could be said with Japanese cuisine . Gyoza and ramen are in fact chinese popularized in Japan only after the second world war

[LAM_AUT_ECU]

What the gentleman says in the end is the key to Italian cooking. My grandma taught me how to cook, she didn't cook to feed us, she cooked to show her love for us.

[Ammon-Ra]

Parmesan may be American. But PARMIGIANO REGGIANO is definitely Italian. Why do Americans think they invented everything??? 😡😡😡

[samurai]

Consiglio al dott. Alberto grandi, storico, di leggere qualche libro di cucina scritto nel XVI, XVII. XVIII ecc. li troverà ricette che lo stupiranno, per esempio nell'opera dello Scappi del XVI sec. o il Cuoco piemontese del 1791 o mille altri testi simili, così si renderà conto che le ricette della cucina italiana hanno una lunghissima tradizione. A proposito del parmigiano; E' citato già nell'anno 1.000 era prodotto a Lodi e lo chiamavano grana o formaggio di Milano perchè veniva commercializzato li. Consiglio anche di leggere il menu del banchetto che i Medici hanno dato per la festa in onore della figlia Maria che andava in sposa al Re di Francia e che si è poi portata al seguito i cuochi di casa. Per quanto riguarda le nonne mia nonna, nata nel 1887, cucinava benissimo e con poco realizzava ottimi pranzi e cene. Se poi volesse esagerare nell'approfondire c'è in edizione moderna anche con doppio testo latino - italiano il de Re Coquinaria di Apicius contemporaneo di Plinio il vecchio.

[TeddyAura]

This guy seems to work for the American multinationals to avoid Italian cuisine to be part of Unesco world heritage.

[Carloshache]

1. Pizza dates all the way back from the Middle ages. It was not invented in Naples but Neapolitan pizza was originally just a variety of pizza that became famous. Different regional varities of Pizza used to exist all over Italy and beyond. You have for example Sfincione, Pizzolo, Pizza pugliese, Pizza al tegamino, Rianata, Piscilandrea from Liguria. Some recipes for focaccia are also very similar to pizza (such as Focaccia messinese). Some of these regional pizza styles have influenced American pizza culture quite a bit, pan pizza and deep dish pizza or "cold cheese" pizza being descendants. Then you have stuffed pizzas of which there are countless varieties. Calzone is the only one world famous today.

2. Carbonara is just a name of one of the varities of "Pasta caci e uova" pasta with egg and cheese- A dish found throughout central and southern Italy with many variations. There are many of these traditional dishes which involve pasta, eggs, salt pork and cheese which makes it ridiculous to claim that it's not originally Italian. The story of American militaries taking eggs and bacon to Italy and thus creating the dish, is not credible. The combination existed before. Some very old pasta dishes, such as Timballo use this combination. Even adding peas and cream to similar dishes existed as variations on similar dishes, in Italy.

3. Olive oil was very much used in Ancient Roman cuisine and has been used in food since at least early Bronze age. Even though it was expensive at times doesn't mean that it wasn't used, especially in southern Italy and olive oil producing areas where it was cheaper. There are many olive oil recipes with continuity all the way from the ancient Roman ages such as Pesto genovese which is very similar to an Ancient Roman paste called Moretum. Olive oil breads and Italian salad dressings also go back to ancient Rome, and things such as dipping bread into oil and vinegar (which many Italians do).

Grandis confidence and the way he just makes a bunch of sweeping claims is frankly incredulous, but the fact of the matter is that he doesn't even know the details of Italian cuisine. He just makes up history as he sees fit.

[TheCyberDruid]

Pellegrino Artusi's cookbook is from 1891 and uses olive oil as food. I guess that 'professor' didn't do a great job at research.

[goyakat]

The guy is mostly right, and even most of things that we know as of italian are not. Pizza was a comon thing in greece or other mediterarian regions for thousands of years.

[ophthalmophobicnpc]

I dont know why but it seems Alberto Grandi (for whatever reason) decided to go on a crusade against Italian cuisine. Must be for personal reasons, I cant explain it otherwise.

[juanmartinreborati]

The dude is just trying to sell his book…

[EdRussel-uk]

Mhh, in my opinion, the problem is that many people do not delve deeply enough into the history of italian cuisine. who is bartolomeo scappi for example, 99% do not know about it. the cuisine in italy is fully documented

[ivanpetro]

I am sure that, in the 1970' when I was a kid, my italian grandmother always had Olive oil in her kitchen.

[riccardozaga]

"Il vero parmigiano reggiano che arriva dal Wisconsin" Purtroppo non mi sorprende che un professore dell'Università di Parma dica una cosa del genere, l'Emilia Romagna vuole livellarsi, prima hanno puntato tutto sulla gestione del territorio e ora visto che il bagno al fiume è garantito ogni fine settimana è arrivato il momento di puntare sull'istruzione 😂😂😂😂😂😂

[AlbertoRighi-hr]

6th myth: Dr. Grandi's credibility.

The flath-earther of italian gastronomy.

[erenkur]

I can't speak about the Italians, but the sayings about olive oil is partially true. I am from Turkey and my father is from Antalya, the only liquid oil in my grandmothers house was the olive oil. Indeed olive oil was used in cooking, but, there is a but, never in quantities shown in some mediterranean recipes. My grandmother would travel to her village in mountains, collect the olives from steep mountain orchards and share the crop with people who taken the care of the trees. The olive pressing would take three days, at least. She would crash them with stones, since the mountain village had no mill, and roads and Motor cars not available to Transport the crop. Then she would left the crushed olives in sacks to ferment, then she would pour warm water oevr them, squeze them and collect the oil pooled over the water. It was inefficient, time and energy consuming process and olive oil was precious, but free since they had trees. So, my grandmother would use olive oil to season the olives in breakfast, with lemons and thyme. They would eat the oil with thyme and bread in winter cure diseases, and to be filled. She would cook vegatable dishes with olive oil but just in enough amount, not by pouring it. And they would not eat red meat except feast time. And when they purchase or sloughter a chicken or hunt some birds, they would Grill them, or boil them, make rice and soup with the broth and fry the meaty parts in butter. And in the colder parts of Turkey, areas my other ancestors came from. Olive oil was a commodity and expensive. They would use the rendered fats from sheep, and butter ocasionaly, before the rise of cheaper oils. I know the Turkey from my grandparents stories, but I believe the italy would be the same. Perhaps in the parts of italy where soil and climate is wetter the situation could be different, but i don't think it would be more different in southern parts. Today we don't make our own oil, the machines are doing it, and thanks to irrigation, fertilisers and chemicals we have good harvest, and thanks to that we don't pay a Fortune for the food. But in past oil was precious