Tag: Bastianich

Lidia Bastianich at The Taste Awards 2024: double success – Italian cuisine reinvented by Gordon Ramsay

Lidia Bastianich has just finished celebrating 25 years of presence on TV, since it aired the first episode of Lydia’s Table, the very popular TV show on the American public channel PBS. After six public television series, two Emmys and four James Beard Awards, Lidia Bastianich achieves a new milestone, the grand final of The Taste Awards, now in its 15th edition, for broadcasts Lydia’s Kitcken And Lidia Celebrates America. «Being a professional in my business for more than fifty years is rewarding, but every recognition and award I receive along the way rekindles my passion and gratitude for a profession I love. So I am grateful and excited to be one of the finalists at The Taste Awards”, she says when reached by phone. THE Taste Awards they are considered in the United States as the Oscars of food and lifestyle in general, and for 15 years they have been awarded annually to creatives, producers, hosts and directors of food, fashion, health, travel and lifestyle programs broadcast on television , in films, online videos, streaming, radio, podcasts and even photography.

The table as a place of feelings

The name of the first broadcast, the one that made it famous throughout the United States, Lydia’s Table, has a very specific foundation. «The kitchen table is the most important place in the house. There we feed ourselves to live, but we also feed ourselves on feelings, love, wisdom, sharing, education… , he adds. And it is in fact around the table in her kitchen in Coney Island, New York, that Lidia taught her children and grandchildren to cook, like gnocchi, the memory dish that she always keeps with great affection. Lidia is also the testimonial of the project The Tales of the Roots, created in collaboration with the MAECIand recently presented at the Farnesina in the presence of the Ministers Tajani and Lollobrigida during the launch of the eighth edition of SCIM – Week of Italian Cuisine in the World 2023.

Food as a positive message

In a recent interview, during the celebrations of the 25th year of TV, Lidia Bastianich underlined the importance of food. «I think that cooking and eating together is a powerful antidote to today’s cultural as well as food disorders. Food is a positive message, its preparation unites us in an act of mutual care and sharing, whether it is with family or friends. Even enemies could be defeated by cooking and eating together. It means understanding each other, understanding and accepting each other’s cultures and wishing each other well-being.”

There are two programs with which Lidia reached the final of the Taste Awards: Lidia Celebrates America, where the chef visits and cooks alongside many different people – veterans, farmers, immigrants, immigrants – trying to tap into their lives and passions in the kitchen. AND Lydia’s Kitchen where, instead, he dispenses his advice and recipes from the kitchen of his home, on Long Island, in the state of New York.

Lidia is also a protagonist in Italy

Lidia is also a well-known face in Italy. The majority, perhaps, know his son Joe more, due to his various appearances on television as a judge on Masterchef Italia, as well as on Beijing Express. She was also a judge, with Bruno Barbieri and Alessandro Borghese, of Junior MasterChef Italy in 2014 and 2015. In Bastianich’s TV CV, also among her latest appearances Family Food Fight in 2021, of which she was a judge together with her son Joe and Antonino Cannavacciuolo. It was the first cooking show where it was not individual chefs who competed in the kitchen but entire families, aged between 16 and 80.

Lidia Bastianich: «The most beautiful recipes and memories of my life in Italy – Italian Cuisine

Lidia Bastianich is an Italian naturalized American chef, television personality and writer. She is not least a mother and grandmother, caring, sometimes severe, but always respectful of her Italian roots. Yes, because Lidia Bastianich’s origins are Istrian, when Istria still belonged to Italy, at least until 1975, when our country – with the controversial Treaty of Osimo – definitively and without compensation, renounced its right to those territories . We asked her for some anecdotes about her when she lived in Istria, with her parents and all her relatives, many of whom are no longer here today. But also what she brought with her, to bring those memories back to life with thought and deeds.

This important theme of mixing memories and cuisine is the fulcrum of the project The Tales of the Roots, created in collaboration with the MAECIwhich was recently presented at the Farnesina in the presence of the Ministers Tajani and Lollobrigida during the launch of the eighth edition of SCIM – Week of Italian Cuisine in the World 2023. Naturally, Lidia Bastianich could not fail to be part of this magnificent story of Italian immigration in the world, and here we are already telling you about a first taste.

Grandma Rosa and the farmyard animals

«I grew up with my grandmother Rosa in the countryside, in Pula, in Istria, among animals, among the products of the earth. I still remember the courtyard of the house and this scene: the grandparents, their brothers, the various aunts, all with aprons and handkerchiefs tied on their heads. It was them, the aunts, who at the table reminded us to never waste food, “there are children who don’t eat too much”, they said. Today Italian cuisine for me is a memory, a nostalgia, a passion, a way to receive and give love. It was, to all intents and purposes, not only a stimulus for what I have done and am doing in the United States but also a confirmation of who I am. As a child I grew up in a comfort zone, in the countryside, among the chickens, goats and rabbits that I fed. I was the “runner”, the “helper”, Grandma Rosa’s helper in the kitchen, especially on Sundays. I still remember those intoxicating smells of the sauce that boiled for hours, where the stove was, in the “black” house, next to the chicken coop. But also the scent of laurel, rosemary, tomato preserves, which I liked to “touch”, a little furtively, with a piece of bread.”

Farewell to Italy, without warning

«When I emigrated to the United States, in 1958, I was 12 years old, it was food that reminded me of my childhood: cooking made me feel good because it took me back to that bygone period. Once I arrived in New York I asked myself: “Why do I love cooking so much?”. I think it was instinct that made me go back to my origins: I was a child and at the time I never imagined that I would never see home againthen over time I understood it and, with regret, I thought that I hadn’t been able to say goodbye to my grandmother Rosa, my goats, my aunts… Well, with cooking I brought my land, my family, to America .

That small kitchen, but small… like that

«A tradition kept alive with passion, enthusiasm and love for four generations, even when, as soon as we arrived overseas, Caritas assigned us a small apartment with a kitchen as small as a closet. There, however, we had meals with family and friends, not without difficulty: we passed the food from hand to hand, since there wasn’t enough space. Then, as soon as I could, in reaction, I treated myself to a large Kitchen! Among the dishes we prepared most often were rice and potatoes, polenta with cheese, pan-fried cabbage and, above all, gnocchi, which even today, when I eat them, are an internal caress, they give me a “sensation” unique. A tradition that continues in New York and that I have also passed on to my grandchildren.

Around the table kneading the gnocchi

As children, my grandchildren all sat around the table kneading dough, just like my grandmother did with me; Now they are adults, they go to university, but they call me to ask for advice: “How to make the sauce, how long the broth should boil, etc.” I am very happy that they too, in addition to my children, can carry their origins with them, despite being born in America. The culture of food transcends birth, but belongs to the origins of the family. Also because there is a substantial difference between Italians and Americans, we always bring food with us. For this reason, Italian cuisine in the United States is the most appreciated, also thanks to the first Italian Americans who came here in 1800 to seek their fortune, bringing with them regional traditions. Very different from my Istrian ones, because theirs were from southern Italy. So, as an adult, I began to travel far and wide across the Bel Paese, so I discovered regional dishes and brought them to the States. This was my luck, this was my choice, this was my life.”

Joe Bastianich is auctioning 30 thousand bottles of wine – Italian Cuisine

One of the most important Italian wine collections in the world, created and supervised by Joe Bastianich, soon at auction. Part of the proceeds will be donated to one or more charities for projects dedicated to children in the United States, to be determined at the end of the auction.

If you are a wine lover, write these dates now: July 24 and 25, 2020. These are the key days to have the opportunity to bring home an (or more!) Excellent bottle of wine from the extraordinary collection of the famous Restaurant Man and wine expert Joe Bastianich, made up of bottles arriving directly from the production cellars and often bottled specifically for his Del Posto restaurant in New York City.

We talk about over 30 thousand bottles of fine and rare wines including encyclopaedic offers of Italian treasures such as Gaja, Conterno, Rinaldi, Bartolo Mascarello, Ornellaia, Sassicaia and others – there is really plenty of choice! Let's go into more detail. Between rarities and encyclopedic harvests of the most important producers who have made the history of Italian wine, the auction will boast more than 3 thousand lots for an impressive offer that includes, among others, selections of Barolo and Barbaresco by Bruno Giacosa, Angelo Gaja, Bartolo Mascarello, Giacomo Conterno and Giuseppe Rinaldi; Super Tuscans of the Tenuta dell’Ornellaia, Sassicaia and Tignanello as well as a very rare selection of Burgundy with Domaine de la Romanée-Conti for a total estimated excess in a worth between 3.1 and 4.5 million dollars.

For collectors, the vertical of Monfortino Riserva, Giacomo Conterno, with bottles that tell the story of the winery from 1941 to 2013 (also through some rare large formats), or Barolo Giuseppe Rinaldi 1964 or Recioto della Valpolicella Classico Gran Riserva by Giuseppe Quintarelli 1983 or Sassicaia, Tenuta San Guido 1985, Masseto Tenuta dell'Ornellaia 2005 Magnum or Marsala Riserva Superiore by Marco De Bartoli from 1860. The complete catalog of the sale is available on the Hart Davis Hart website.

"It is with a mixture of sadness and pride that we have decided to put a part of this impressive collection on the market," he says Joe Bastianich. «They are bottles that speak of me, of my story, of my soul dedicated to wine. But the time has come, I am happy to be able to share these wines, and especially these vintages, with the world. I hope they will find interested palates who know how to fully enjoy them .

The auction will be held on Friday 24 and Saturday 25 July at the famous auction house and dealer of internationally renowned wines Hart Davis Hart Wine Co. Tenderers will be able to use the HDH platform available via their mobile app or online, to place their offers remotely and live.

Important detail: part of the proceeds will be donated to one or more charities for projects dedicated to children in the United States, to be determined at the end of the auction.