Italian Food Culture

The Italian culture has a very rich tradition in food, arts, music, literature. The list goes on. Italian food is considered one of the best food palates in the world. It is full of flavor that will surely tantalize your taste buds which you will surely enjoy.

Italian food culture has influenced a lot of countries already. It is known to captivate the taste buds of so many people from different cultures around the world. Thus, these people adopted what they liked about Italian food and added locally grown ingredients and incorporated them into their own traditional dishes, and made them their own.

Popular Foods

All Fresh Ingredients

Once you’ve seen an Italian chef or home cook create an Italian dish, you will automatically notice that the ingredients used in cooking are nothing but fresh. The Italian food culture focuses more on choosing fresh, quality ingredients than on intricate preparations.

Italy is a pretty diverse country and every region offers different fresh produce that makes it readily available throughout Italy. From fresh eggs to oil, vegetables, meat, fish, herbs, and cheeses, Italian food is all about the freshness of all the ingredients they put into their dishes.

Tradition

Italy has a rich tradition. Each region boasted its own dishes where they carefully incorporated their respective traditions. Contrary to what most people from other parts of the world might have thought, no place in Italy eats the same dish as the next.

In the north of Italy, for instance, people in this region cook more meat, potatoes, and rice than their neighboring areas. The very popular Italian dishes like pizza and pasta are more local in the central part of Italy. While in the South, their dishes are usually cooked with fresh tomatoes and fresh fish. For example, Sicily has been occupied by many different cultures and has influenced their cooking styles significantly. Almonds, couscous, and tomatoes are only a few items brought to the island by their occupiers.

Keeping it Fresh

When it comes to buying food in Italy, it's a common trend to choose local markets and stores as opposed to larger-scale supermarkets. The big advantage of the market is that it offers home-grown and fresh produce that's both healthy and delicious in equal measures.

A recent report from Euromonitor International has said that Italians are continuing to love their fresh food. 2014 saw a period of recovery after a recent slump as a result of the global economic crisis. The report said that 2014 had seen a greater upswing in traditional consumption in Italy with more home cooking and baking.

Simplicity

Italian cuisines are more attentive to how fresh their ingredients are and not the recipe’s complexity. Typical Italian food only requires a few ingredients to create and this is what makes Italians amazing.

They can do a lot of wonders with such little ingredients and no one will ever notice. This is how talented they are when it comes to crafting a dish. Cooking is considered a work of art or craft by most Italian and almost everyone in Italy knows how to cook.