Salon

During my recent trip to Italy, I often consulted "Food: Italian Bliss," a new book by Yelena Kostyukovich, perhaps best known as the Russian translator of Umberto Eco. In Italy, food is invariably one of the main impressions of the traveler, and matters of gastronomical etiquette are very important. Kostyukovich recounts an episode when a Russian guest asked for tea after lunch at the house of an Italian journalist. "I was completely taken aback," said the hostess. "But what do you think -- I told everyone: 'Let's drink tea!' And we all drank tea, as if nothing had happened!"

So what happened? Italians never drink tea after lunch, only coffee. And if you don't think that's a big deal, then you just don't appreciate the Italian soul. My experiences confirmed Kostyukovich's observations more than once. One time, I went to an establishment labeled a pizzeria and asked the waitress if I could get a pizza. She looked flabbergasted. "Well, yes," she said, "in the evening." The problem? It was lunchtime, but pizza is not eaten at lunch. On another occasion, a waiter listened to me very politely, nodded and then brought a dinner that had nothing in common with my order, saying at each course: "It's not a meal. Just to have a taste while you're waiting." I must confess the food was fantastic. Kostyukovich says the only real choice a foreign visitor has is between meat and fish.

The book has chapters about certain products that are universal for Italy, such as olive oil or pasta, but otherwise it is structured by regions, from the exquisite tastes of Tuscany to the down-to-earth simplicity of Calabria. Like any good food writer, Kostyukovich sometimes digresses into culture and literature. A funny piece of trivia: Dante's famous lament about the bitter bread of exile ("salty," not "bitter," in the Italian original) was actually just a complaint about salted Ravenna bread compared with the unflavored dough of his native Florence.

If there's one shortcoming in Kostyukovich's book, it's that she does not include a single recipe. But Italian cookbooks are a dime a dozen, while a socio-cultural guidebook centered on food is something totally new for Russia. And other nations will soon enjoy it too. "Food: Italian Bliss," commended in a foreword by Umberto Eco himself, is a part of a major international project, and will soon be published in several other languages. It seems so right. After all, there is no better way to overcome national and cultural differences than over a meal.