Never Trust A Skinny Italian Chef

by Massimo Bottura

Overview

Never Trust a Skinny Italian Chef is a tribute to three-michelin star restaurant, Osteria Francescana and the twenty-five year career of its chef, Massimo Bottura, 'the Jimi Hendrix of Italian chefs'. Voted #1 in the S. Pellegrino World's 50 Best Restaurants Awards 2016.

Osteria Francescana is Italy's most celebrated restaurant. At Osteria Francescana, chef Massimo Bottura (as featured on Netflix's Chef's Table) takes inspiration from contemporary art to create highly innovative dishes that play with Italian culinary traditions.

Never Trust a Skinny Italian Chef is a tribute to Bottura's twenty-five year career and the evolution of Osteria Francescana. Divided into four chapters, each one dealing with a different period, the book features 50 recipes and accompanying texts explaining Bottura's inspiration, ingredients and techniques. Illustrated with photography by Stefano Graziani and Carlo Benvenuto, Never Trust a Skinny Italian Chef is the first book from Bottura - the leading figure in modern Italian gastronomy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780714867144
Publisher:	Phaidon Press
Publication date:	10/06/2014
Pages:	296
Sales rank:	675,321
Product dimensions:	11.90(w) x 8.80(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Massimo Bottura is the chef patron of Osteria Francescana, a three Michelin star restaurant based in Modena, Italy. Massimo grew up in Modena and developed an interest in cooking from a young age after watching his mother, grandmother and aunt in the kitchen preparing family meals. In 1986 he left a law degree to open his first restaurant and subsequently went on to develop his love of food with stages for Alain Ducasse at Louis XV in Monte Carlo and Ferran Adriá at elbulli. He opened Osteria Francescana in 1995.

Editorial Reviews

★ 10/20/2014
Despite its whimsical title, this eclectic and ambitious collection is all about serious cooking. Bottura, chef/owner of Osteria Francescana, challenges the culinary traditions of Emilia-Romagna, where the Michelin-starred restaurant is located. Trained by such culinary giants as Alain Ducasse and Ferran Adrià, Bottura is willing to update, revise, or even redo a dish completely to bring the best of the past into the future. Comprising glorious full-color photos of everything from ingredients and finished plates to people and everyday Italian life, the book emphasizes beauty, both in the simple and in the elaborate. Recipes are relegated to a mere 23 pages at the back, and while they’re certainly within a skilled home cook’s capabilities, most are complex concoctions that many will happily leave to the professionals. Quirky dishes such as a deconstructed mortadella sandwich made with mortadella foam; bread, butter, and anchovies; and a compression of pasta and beans make this a fun collection to peruse, but one unlikely to inspire home cooks. Professionals, however, will relish the opportunity for guided experimentation with Italian classics. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

Featured on the Netflix documentary series Chef's Table

"Massimo Bottura is the Jimi Hendrix of Italian chefs... he takes familiar dishes and classical flavors and techniques and turns them on their heads in a way that is innovative, boundary-breaking, sky kissing, and entirely whimsical, but ultimately timeless, and most importantly, deliciously satisfying." – Mario Batali

'A pioneer of modern Italian cooking, Bottura possesses both a deep respect for local traditions and a drive to keep blowing them up.' – Wall Street Journal

'Never Trust a Skinny Italian Chef is an incredible book, as rich with inspiration as Massimo’s dishes are with flavor.' – Cindy Sherman

'Never Trust a Skinny Italian Chef demonstrates that food has indeed morphed into an element of high culture.' – The New York Times Book Review

'This is more than just a conventional map of how to cook; it is the best study yet of how a highly original and creative chef thinks and works.' – Economist

'The genius of Bottura lies in his ability to transcend opposites. In his inventive new book, Never Trust a Skinny Italian Chef, he offers a mix of recipes and memoir, with striking photography by Carlo Benvenuto and Stefano Graziani.' – Food & Wine

'The book is a wonder – full of photos of food, setting and whimsy. Fascinating windows into the workings of one of cooking’s greatest minds.' – LA Times

'Massimo Bottura is a luminary of the culinary avant-garde.' – New Yorker

'Energetic, engrossing, and often quite funny ... Hard to put down.' – Tasting Table

'Bottura is part of a new word order of chefs, intently focused on their terroir, but global in reach.' – GQ

'A heady trip into the thoughtful mind of the three-Michelin-starred culinary genius.' – Slate

'A tribute to the 'Jimi Hendrix of Italian chefs' ... Not only does it tell the story of his special journey with food it also features 50 of his amazing and inventive recipes.' – Elle Decoration (South Africa)

'Bring a bit of Italy to UK shores ... Will teach you to cook in a way that will make your old nonna proud.' – Shortlist

From the Publisher