L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, APRIL 17, 2025 www.italoamericano.org 10 L'Italo-Americano C arbonara Day, celebrated every year on April 6, was launched in 2017 by Unione I t a l i a n a F o o d a n d t h e I n t e r n a t i o n a l P a s t a Organisation to honor and share one of the most iconic dishes of Italian cuisine with the world: pasta alla car- bonara. To mark this year's celebration, Coop Alleanza 3 . 0 — I t a l y ' s l a r g e s t c o n - sumer cooperative—inter- viewed Alberto Grandi , Associate Professor of Food History at the University of Parma, to shed light on the debated and often surprising origins of this dish. Grandi, author of Denom- inazione di origine inventata ("Invented Designation of Origin"), has long been at the center of public debate on t h e r e l a t i o n s h i p b e t w e e n Italian cuisine and national identity. A few months ago, L'Italo Americano also fea- tured his work, which chal- lenges romanticized views of culinary tradition and invites readers to adopt a more criti- cal and historically grounded perspective. In this interview, conduct- e d b y C o o p A l l e a n z a 3 . 0 , P r o f e s s o r G r a n d i o f f e r s sharp insights into the cre- ation and evolution of car- bonara—a dish now consid- ered quintessentially Roman, but whose true origins, as he explains, are far more global and complex than most Ital- ians might think. What are the origins o f c a r b o n a r a ? I s i t a Roman dish? Its exact origins are still quite murky, but we do know the broader outline of its his- tory. It's a recipe closely tied to the presence of American troops in Italy during World War II, who supplied the key ingredients: bacon and eggs — usually in powdered form. Food historian Luca Cesari has said that carbonara is an A m e r i c a n r e c i p e c o n c e p t born in Italy, which Italians gradually, if slowly, adopted as their own. The association with Rome is certainly one of several possible connections. O v e r t i m e , c a r b o n a r a became so strongly identified with the city that we now t h i n k o f i t a s d i s t i n c t l y Roman — but that's not nec- essarily the case. American t r o o p s w e r e s t a t i o n e d throughout Italy during that period, not just in Rome. So, would it be fair to say that carbonara is a dish adopted by Rome? Yes, you could say that. It's a n A m e r i c a n r e c i p e t h a t happened to emerge in Italy, so it is, in a sense, an adopt- ed dish. On the other hand, i t s A m e r i c a n o r i g i n s a r e undeniable— the first recipe was published in the United S t a t e s b e f o r e i t e v e r appeared in Italy. How do you explain its a b s e n c e f r o m I t a l i a n cookbooks until the mid- 1 9 5 0 s ? A n d g i v e n a l l t h i s , h o w d i d I t a l i a n s d e v e l o p s u c h a s t r o n g a t t a c h m e n t t o c a r - bonara? It's missing from earlier cookbooks simply because the recipe, in the form we know it today, didn't exist. There were certainly pasta d i s h e s m a d e w i t h b a c o n , eggs, and cheese, but they weren't part of mainstream Italian taste at the time. Ital- ians eventually embraced it — probably because it was a hearty dish, and in post-war, hunger-stricken Italy, that m a t t e r e d . W h a t ' s r e a l l y interesting is how we got f r o m t h o s e e a r l y c i r c u m - stances to today, when car- bonara has become almost a r e l i g i o n . I o f t e n j o k e : i f someone adds cream to car- bonara, is there a Roman ready to throw themselves into the Tiber? How did this dish become such a powerful cultural symbol? What's your take on that transformation? I n m y v i e w , c a r b o n a r a became iconic because it's easy to make but also lends itself to endless variations. That gives so-called "gastro- nationalists" the chance to wave the flag of the true car- bonara. Not that long ago, it was absolutely normal to make it with diced pancetta and scrambled egg. There was certainly devotion to the dish, but nothing like today's dogmatic obsession with the "carbo-crema." So how has the recipe for carbonara changed over time? Now, it's expected to be made with guanciale, cut into thin strips, with that creamy texture from eggs and pecorino — and heaven forbid anyone dares to use a different cheese. To me, this shift reflects a broader trend in Italian cuisine, which has become a kind of untouch- able totem. Everyone feels entitled to say, "This is the way it's always been done." B u t t h a t ' s h o w t r a d i t i o n turns into mythology. How can we reconcile tradition with contami- nation or outside influ- e n c e s i n t h e k i t c h e n ? For me, the answer lies in r e s e a r c h a n d i n t e l l e c t u a l honesty. As food historian M a s s i m o M o n t a n a r i h a s written, if you dig into the origins of our recipes, you'll always discover that they come from somewhere else. To remain truly traditional, Italian cuisine must embrace o u t s i d e i n f l u e n c e s . T h e moment we try to freeze it, lock it down, and build walls around it, we kill it. Because if there's one genuinely tra- ditional trait in Italian cook- ing, it's the constant open- n e s s t o o t h e r c u l t u r e s , flavors, and culinary ideas. So what can we hon- estly define as "Italian" in cooking? I believe what's truly Ital- ian is invention and contam- ination. That's the heart of our culinary identity. And there's another point that often gets overlooked. Which is? That our cuisine is easy — it's technically simple. And for a long time, that simplic- ity was considered the curse of Italian cooking. In what sense "easy"? T h i s i d e a t h a t e v e r y d i s h must now have a scientific or highly technical dimension is very recent. It's a phenom- e n o n d r i v e n m o r e b y t h e media than by any real evo- lution in our gastronomic culture. S o i f w e t a k e c a r - b o n a r a a s a s t a r t i n g point, how did Italian c u i s i n e a s w e k n o w i t t o d a y r e a l l y c o m e about? It's actually the product of t w o b i g h i s t o r i c a l s h i f t s : m a s s e m i g r a t i o n a n d t h e post-war economic boom. Without those two forces, Italians wouldn't have had a c c e s s t o t h e v a r i e t y o f i n g r e d i e n t s t h e y c o u l d experiment with — and later take abroad. As I always say, if you don't have money, you can't buy ingredients and you can't cook. In this sense, cuisine is fundamentally tied to economics. Associate Professor of Food History at the University of Parma, and author, Alberto Grandi (Photo courtesy of Coop Alleanza 3.0) LIFE PEOPLE REVIEWS ADVICE TRADITIONS Beyond the cream debate: what carbonara really tells us about Italian food FRANCESCA BEZZONE

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