A good friend of mine, Saku Tuominen, wrote a wonderful book about pasta. It was published two weeks ago.
The book is called Aglio & Olio, garlic and oil. If you are a pasta-fan this will become your bible.
The basic philosophy of the book is simple. Pasta should be fast and easy to make, and it should taste good.
Saku Tuominen presenting his book at the bookfair in Helsinki.
The book contains over 200 pasta recipes, all of them fairly straight forward. In addition you get a well written history of pasta.
Based on tens of interviews of Italian families, farmers, cooks, restaurant owners and food gurus, Aglio & Olio gives a great flavour of what pasta means to all Italians.
I was especially happy to see many familiar faces and restaurants; the Medici family, Locanda le Logge in Urbisaglia and Elio Vincenzetti, the owner of restaurant Da rosa in Macerata. And all of those wonderful rolling hills around Tolentino and Sanginesio.
Saku is not a cook, nor does he claim to be (he is actually one of the most successful, if not the most successful, TV producers in Finland). Why then should you buy his book? Two reasons: this guy knows pasta and he loves all things Italian.
Trust me, I know. I’ve had the pleasure of eating many of Saku’s pastas in both La Marche (a region in the middle of the east coast of Italy) and Helsinki. He might not be a cook, but he sure as hell knows how to cook.
The lay-out of the book (by Kimmo Kivilahti) and the pictures (Tuukka Koski) are great.
Why am I telling you all of this? After all, the book has been written in Finnish. Well, because it is so good that Bonniers will translate it into English next year.
Silvio here we come!
