Being one of the most popular in the world, Italian cuisine is actually more than pizza and pasta. Filled with secret ingredients, Italian dishes immediately cause admiration, and sometimes even addiction!
So, our Top 10 interesting and unexpected facts about Italian cuisine:
- Over 450 different types of pasta and countless sauces are included in the Italian cookbook.
- Average Italian eats 23 kg of pasta per year. Residents of other European countries absorb about 6 kg per year.
- By the way, the word Spaghetti literally translates to “ropes / threads”, and the Italians themselves call their pasta "maccheroni."
- In the past eaten pasta directly with your handswithout the help of knives and forks!
- Tomatoes, an important component of Italian cuisine, entered the country only in 1700.
- It is noteworthy that the classic Italian cuisine does not accept mixing pasta and meatballs / meatballs
- When the first fast food restaurant opened in Rome in 1986, Italians considered themselves so offended that arranged a free distribution of spaghetti in front of the institution. Thus, they tried to encourage fellow citizens to remember the country's gastronomic heritage.
- The following dishes are considered basic for classic Italian cuisine: olive oil, garlic, basil, oregano, mozzarella, ricotta, parmesan, tomatoes and seafood.
- In the north of the country, Italians prefer butter to olive in cooking.. Moreover, in this zone, most dishes are prepared on the basis of rice, not pasta.
- Long before pasta began to be sold packaged in stores, every self-respecting housewife cooked spaghetti herself. Pasta was dried on special stands in the kitchens of Italians, often even on the street. Even in modern times, you can see a similar picture.
