by Bill Buford
But even this speculation misses the point. I am not persuaded that Catherine de Médicis taught the French how to cook, but I now believe she was one of several important culinary influences. By the sixteenth century, many in France recognized that Italian cooking had been enjoying a long renaissance—a sideshow beside the flourishing of the Renaissance itself. In 1505, Platina’s account of the Maestro Martino was translated into French and became widely popular. Ten years later, Giovanni Rosselli located the Maestro’s own manuscript (the one Platina plagiarized), claimed it as his own, and published it under the title of Epulario: this, too, was immediately translated. The papal courts in Avignon had Italian cooks, as did Catherine’s father-in-law. Rabelais had already written about his three trips to the Italian peninsula; Montaigne was about to embark on his own journey. Did Catherine single-handedly change French cooking? No. But she was clearly the culmination of a trend that had been well under way by the time she crossed the Alps (or the Mediterranean).
This was no time for me to open a restaurant. When I thought back on what I’d learned in Italy—the fifteenth-century arista, the Medicean terrines and ragùs, the thigh, the Renaissance ravioli, the recipes of Martino—I saw that I’d mastered food in one tradition (I’ll call it the Florentine-Tuscan-late-Renaissance tradition) up to a certain point: when Caterina became Catherine and crossed the Alps (or the Mediterranean) into France.
I’m not ready, I told Mario. There is still much to learn, and I may never have this opportunity again. I want to follow Catherine de Médicis. If I’m really to understand Italian cooking, I need to cross the Alps and learn what happened next. I have to go to France.
Acknowledgments
The reference to the first use of “pasta,” in Cagliari, in 1351, is from Pasta: The Story of a Universal Food by Silvano Serventi and Fransoise Sabban, translated by Antony Shugaar (2000). The reference to the first published account of a corn polenta in Italy is from Italian Cuisine: A Cultural History by Alberto Capatti and Massimo Montanari, translated by Aine O’Healy (1999). Italian Cuisine also describes the autobiography of Antonio Latini. The dominant demand food theory is described in Culture of the Fork: A Brief History of Food in Europe by Giovanni Rebora, translated by Albert Sonnenfeld (1998).
In addition to the obvious texts, the following books were especially useful: On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen (1984, and the revised and enlarged edition of 2004) by Harold McGee; Platina, On Right Pleasure and Good Health, edited and translated by Mary Ella Milham (1998); and Apicius, Cookery and Dining in Imperial Rome, edited and translated by Joseph Dommers Vehling. In addition, several Italian texts were essential, including the two-volume collection Arte della Cucina, Libri di recette testi sopra lo scalco, il trinciante, and i vini, edited by Emilio Faccioli (1966); the facsimile edition of the 1692 text of Lo scalo alla moderna, overo l’arte di ben disporre i conviti by Antonio Latini (1993); Ne pomodoro ne pasta, 150 piatti napoletani del seicento, edited by Claudio Novelli (2003); and the facsimile edition of the 1570 text of Opera dell’arte del cucinare by Bartolomeo Scappi (2002).
I am very grateful for the advice and comments of those who read the manuscript: Leyla Aker, Jessica Green, Austin Kelley, Cressida Leyshon, David Remnick, and Andrew Wylie, and my two book editors, Dan Franklin in London and Sonny Mehta in New York.
This book would not have been possible, in any shape, without the support, tolerance,encouragement,instruction, and friendship of Mario Batali. A proper expression of my gratitude could fill another tome.
About the Author
Bill Buford is a staff writer for The New Yorker, where he was the fiction editor for eight years. He was the founding editor of Granta magazine and was also the publisher of Granta Books. He is the author of Among the Thugs, a non-fiction account of crowd violence and British soccer hooliganism. He lives in New York City with his wife, Jessica Green, and their two sons.
ALSO BY BILL BUFORD
Among the Thugs
THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF
Copyright © 2006 by William Buford
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
www.aaknopf.com
Portions of this work previously appeared in The New Yorker.
Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Buford, Bill.
Heat: an amateur’s adventures as kitchen slave, line cook, pasta-maker, and apprentice to a Dante-quoting butcher in Tuscany / Bill Buford.
p. cm.
eISBN-13: 978-1-4000-4375-0
eISBN-10: 1-4000-4375-1
1. Cookery, Italian—Tuscan style. 2. Food—Italy—Tuscany. I. Title.
TX723.2.T86B83 2001
641.59455—dc22 2005057868
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