Meeting an uncommon Artusi
Pellegrino Artusi is known worldwide for the famous ‘Practical Manual for Families’ Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well, compiled and revised directly by the author over twenty years (fifteen editions from 1891 to 1911), and enriched with 315 recipes in addition to the 475 of the first edition thanks to the immediate contact established between the author and his readers, who wrote to him expressing opinions and doubts, asking for and giving advices, suggesting new recipes.
The editorial success then determined by the Italian public is still going on: the volume Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well is constantly re-edited, copied, and translated (into ten languages, to date), to the point that Artusi, even more than a person, is nowadays identified as synonym for ‘cookery book’.
In the year of the celebration for the 200th anniversary of his birth, Casa Artusi reminds us ‘the man’ Pellegrino Artusi proposing the Readings from the "Autobiografia”, curated by actor Denio Derni.
In these pages – written in 1903 and revealed in 1993 – there are memories of the early childhood spent in Romagna, in Forlimpopoli, where the family had a shop, stories of his youth, as the first visit to Venice, of his civil commitment in favour of the new Kingdom of Italy, of the tragic facts which caused the definitive moving to Florence.
In Florence, Artusi became a silk merchant but also discovered his vocation for the study and gastronomy, becoming the renowned author who popularized a simple gastronomic programme anyone can follow, summed up in the triad "Hygiene-Economy-Good Taste" (a triad also standing out on the cover of the 1891 edition).
The Readings from the "Autobiografia” are available on ArtusiCento, the Foundation's YouTube channel (in Italian):
- Chapter 1 Nacqui a Forlimpopoli
- Chapter 2 Altro che falde
- Chapter 3 La vetusta grandezza
- Chapter 4 Amor di Patria
- Chapter 5 La notte del Passatore
On ArtusiCento channel, many other videos on Artusian recipes and curiosity, and unusual tributes as the one by Veronica Gonzales and her Feet Theatre.