Amarcord, Marcella Remembers : The Remarkable Life Story of the Woman Who Started Out Teaching Science in a Small Town in Italy, but Ended up Teaching America How to Cook Italian Hardcover - 2008

by Marcella Hazan; Victor Hazan

The food publishing event of the seasonbestsellingcookbook author Marcella Hazan tells how a young girl raised in Emilia-Romagna became America's godmother of Italian cooking.

Widely credited with introducing proper Italian food to the English-speakingworld, Marcella Hazan is as authentic as they come. Raised in Cesenatico,a quiet fishing town on the northern Adriatic Sea, she'd eventually have herown cooking schools in New York, Bologna, and Venice. There she would teach studentsfrom around the world to appreciate and produce the food that native Italians eat.She'd write bestselling and award-winning cookbooks, collect invitations to cook at toprestaurants, and have thousands of loyal students and readers some so devoted they'dname their daughters Marcella. Her fans will be as surprised and delighted by how thisall came to be as Marcella herself has been.

Marcella begins with her early childhood in Alexandria, Egypt, where she broke herarm. After nearly losing the arm to poor medical treatment, she was taken back toher father's native Italy for surgery. There the family would remain. Her teenage yearscoincided with World War II, and the family relocated temporarily to Lake Garda notanticipating that it would be one of the war's greatest targets. After years of privationand bombings, Marcella was fulfilling her ambition to become a doctor and professor ofscience when she met Victor, the love of her life. They married and moved to New YorkCity. Marcella knew not a word of English or what's more surprising a single recipe.She began to attempt to re-create the flavors of her homeland. She took a Chinesecooking class in the early '60s with women who asked her to teach them Italian cooking,and she began to give them lessons. Soon after, Craig Claiborne invited himself tolunch, and the rest is history.

Amarcord means 'I remember' in Marcella's native Romagnolo dialect. In these pagesMarcella, now eighty-four, looks back on the adventures of a life lived for pleasure anda love of teaching. Throughout, she entertains the reader with stories of the humorous,sometimes bizarre twists and turns that brought her love, fame, and a chance to changethe way we eat forever.