Letizia Mattiacci has published a beautiful Italian cookbook entitled, A Kitchen with a View, Seasonal Recipes from Alla Madonna del Piatto Cooking School in Umbria, Italy. True to it’s title, the book is broken down by season and weights are conveniently given in both volume and metric weight.
The book is not only overflowing with recipes but photographs of the beautiful countryside and dishes as well as stories of Italian life including a piece entitled How to Make and Drink Coffee Like an Italian.
Letizia starts us off with Food Processor Pasta Dough and includes recipes for Gluten Free Dough and many other pasta variations such as Kamut Flour Cappelletti, Stringozzi and Maltagliati. Breads and pizza are covered as well. The recipes and instructions (including step-by-step photographs) are wonderful for porchetta. And the desserts — Salted Almond Praline Gelato, Lemon Profiterole Delights, Limoncello Melon Panna Cotta and Grazia’s Chantilly Cream – all looks tempting. The book is chock full of delicious Italian creations.
Update: Tonight I made the Umbrian Style Chicken Alla Cacciatoria from the book and it smells and tastes heavenly. Great instructions, wonderful flavors and not overly complicated.
This is a gorgeous book and one I will turn to again and again. Letizia teaches us that Italian food can be light and fresh and very accessible to everyone.
Winner chosen: Random Number Generator chose #61 Jeff Tix. Congratulations!
Giveaway: Letizia is offering one of you a chance to win a copy of this beautiful book. Please leave a comment on this post telling me about your favorite Italian dish. The offer is open worldwide. A random winner will be chosen on July 17th. Good luck.
Oh this sounds like a great book! Thanks for the opportunity Jenny!
One of my favorite Italian dessert is the cannolies.
My favorite Italian dish is any kind of pasta. I make it all homemade, and have several implements to use. I love it, and being alone, it freezes beautifully so I can take just a little out at a time.
Second favorite is tiramisu…love it!
My favourite Italian dish is chicken parmigiana !!! For dessert nothing makes me happier than tiramisu Thank you Jenny.
I love fish livornese style. I also love traditional Italian seafood salad especially with octopus.
Beautiful! My favorite Italian dish is definitely gnocchi of any and every kind.
Jenny,
Probably my favorite Italian dish ever was the first time I tasted Tiramisu at an outdoor restaurant in Spoleto. I thought that I was going to pass out from the combination of textures and flavors!
The book looks beautiful. My favorite Italian dish is Shrimp Scampi.
My favorite Italian dish is Baked Ziti.
How can I choose just one favorite? We live in an area with wonderful Italian restaurants. I’d love to know how to make more of the sauces that go with veal and chicken dishes. They always seem so simple but so amazingly flavorful.
Looks like a gorgeous book! My favorite? How can I pick, I love it all 🙂
Anything with Alfredo sauce. I love it so much I think I could eat cardboard with that on it.
Anything Parm, Veal, Eggplant. Let’s take a field trip Jenny.
Love any kind of pasta.
My favorite Italian dish Is tiramisu. Love, love!
My favorite italian dish is porchetta: roasted outdoors with lots of garlic, fennel, and rosemary!
What a beautiful cover. We love all the antipasto flavors followed by Linguini con Vongole.
I love cannelloni, but never make it myself.
My absolute favorite Italian dish is polenta with eggs and white truffles
I also love risotto all kinds of seasonal flavors
I would love to win this new book and discover a new Italian favorite
Minestra
I love,love, love Chicken Piccata!
I love homemade pasta and breads; one of my favorite memories is our three-week trip to Northern Italy in 2011. Would love to win this!! 🙂
what a beauty!
Pasta with a simple tomato sauce.
Fresh gnocchi…with a light creme sauce. O! Dear! Love it!
My husband and I took a class with Letizia 3 years ago and loved the simplicity of the Pasta Puttenesca we made in class although it delivered amazing flavor. Letizia told us about using pasta that is bronze cut which provides a rough surface for the sauce to cling to. The other dishes we made in class were also simple but delivered great flavor: zucchini ribbon salad, poached pears in vin santo and pork cutlet roulades. Would love to have a copy of her book for more of her wonderful dishes. Her cooking school is a must when visiting Assisi!
Pappardelle with a Bolognese Sauce.
My favorite Italian dish is cannelloni!
Gorgeous! My favorite Italian dish is an unforgettable rosemary pork in balsamic sauce I had at a restaurant in Castellina in Chianti. Lunch in the vineyard of our cooking class was also tops. Al fresco in Italy, ANY meal is memorable. 🙂
I love my mom’s Chicken Cacciatore! This cookbook sounds like one that I’d like to leave on my counter to enjoy reading. I love cookbooks like this that are telling us stories and showing us the world – thank you for this chance
What a lovely book – decidedly, delightful and delicious. One of my favorite Italian foods is Risotto with Parmigiano.
Looks beautiful and I’m sure delicious.
anything pasta
I especially like Minestrone Soup and this book sounds gorgeous.
Ohhh, this looks stellar! My favorite Italian dish? Polenta in any way, shape, or form:)
Looks like one I need. My favorite Italian dish has to be pappardelle al cinghiale.
I love Spinach Cheese Chicken Stuffed Manicotti.
Just one? Spaghetti alla Carbonara brings back childhood memories of Rome! Congratulations!
My favorite Italian dish is gnocchi with vodka cream sauce!
My favorite Italian dish is gnocchi with vodka cream sauce.
Gnocchi now is my fav
Sounds wonderful!!
Gnochi
When we eat Italian out – I go for manicotti, ravioli etc – things I would like to learn to do at home.
I have too many to pick just one.
My absolute favorite italian dish has got to be lasagna. I prefer making a vegetable lasagna, but my husband insists on meat…so I make one for me, and one for him!
my favorite Meal- lasagna. My brother-in-law made us an authentic ( It sourced ingredients), fresh,to die for one for last year’s Christmas dinner.
Focaccia bread
This looks like a wonderful book. I love Italian food, but am mostly just familiar with the basic pastas and things like that. I’d love to try some authentic recipes from a book such as this one.
Thanks you for the giveaway and opportunity.
Homemade pappardelle with bolognese sauce…mmmmmm… I love everything Italian! !
Thanks Jenny!!
Pasta with pesto because my daughters love to make pesto!
Beautiful.
So hard to pick one! I’m throwing a dart on my list of faves – gnocchi with sage and brown butter!
Any that I can eat in Italy! Looks like a lovely book.
I love ravioli! This book sounds like one I need to use frequently.
Ooooh, favorite Italian dish? I guess it’s gotta be Eggplant Parmigiana. I tasted it the first made for me by an Italian American grandmother that cooked like in the old country. She came with my mom to take care of me when my second daughter was born in Paris and they both spoiled me rotten, taking turns cooking every night. It has become an absolute family favorite.
That cookbook sounds fabulous and I can smell the divine chicken from here!
Anything pasta!
My favorite Italian dish has got to be Sautimboca or Saltimboca…. And I do love a good Frito misto too.
Escarole soup, hands down I love that stuff!!!
This sounds like a terrific book that I may just have to get. Thank you also for the opportunity to win a free copy! I think my favorite Italian dishwould have to be lasagna bolognese – the classic with a rich meaty bolognese and layered with a bechamel rather than ricotta cheese. It’s just the best. Thanks.
Based on Jenny’s description, this may be more of the local color kind of book many people are looking for.
Love tiramisu
My mother’s Penne ala Marchiana! I’m sure I butchered the spelling but it’s a recipe she replicated from a favorite restaurant when we were kids that was delicious!
What a gorgeous looking book. Would love to have this one. My favorite Italian dish is Chicken Piccata, but anything Italian sounds good in my book!
Veal Parm or Eggplant Parm
It’s a tough choice but Fettucine Alfredo makes me happy.
My favorite Italian dish is a simple one – my homemade chicken parmesan.
My bosses homemade ravioli, Chicken Parm, Tiramisu…..& there was a sweet potato gnocchi with brown butter and sage topped with crushed amaretti that was absolutely divine!!!!
That is really impossible…i love so many things. Every region has something, well many things, to love. In Umbria I love the fagiolini di Trasimeno, especially with a nice fish out of lago di Trasimeno.
Lemon Bars for me
Favorite? Simple pasta – oil, garlic, herbs
I love authentic spaghetti carbonara!