Arguably the best cookery program on TV this season is Antonio Carluccio’s investigation of Bartolomeo Scappi the famed 16th Century chef; declared by many as the world’s first celebrity chef.
Scappi was the chef to many popes and published the Opera Dell’Arte del Cucinare a cookbook detailing 1000 recipes. This contained the first known picture of a fork, declared parmesan to be the best cheese on earth and noted that “the liver of [a] domestic goose raised by the Jews is of extreme size and weighs [between] two and three pounds”, indicating that Jews of the time were practicing the overfeeding needed to produce foie gras.
Antonio delves into recipes that are more than 500 years old, cooking eel in Venice, porcini mushrooms in Lombardy, and stuffing a suckling pig in Rome, where he ends his journey with a banquet fit for a pope.
Recipes recreated include Riso alla lombarda (Lombardy-style rice), Torta di funghi (Wild mushroom tart), Sarde in saor (Venetian-style sardines), Pomi sdegnosi (‘Disdainful apples’, a sixteenth century recipe for baked aubergines) and Ravioli con polpo di cappone (Ravioli made with capon breast).
Carluccio and the Renaissance Cookbook is on BBC2, 8pm on Thursday 27th December.
Wonderful programme.As much as I love and do have Antonio’s books. I would like to know if it is possible to purchase the book Opera Dell’Arte and where from?.
Grazi tanto and Buon Anno x
I’ve done a little on-line searching but I can’t seem to find any reprint of the book being available.
After an hour of searching on-line, as I would also like this book, I have found that Opera by Scappi was reprinted in 1981 by Arnaldo Forni. The book is available on http://www.fornieditore.com for 98 euros. Just click on the British flag in order for the website to be translated into English and then search for Scappi under authors. There is more information on the book if you click on the book reference in red.
Alexandra – you are a star! I am sure many people will appreciate your effort in finding the book. It is not in English I should point out.
The direct link to the order page is
https://www.fornieditore.com/flex/FixedPages/IT/ShowOpera.php/L/IT/SKU/2292%203
and an English translation (of the page not the book)
https://www.fornieditore.com/flex/FixedPages/IT/ShowOpera.php/L/EN/SKU/2292%203
Once again, many thanks Alexandra.
Andrew – Thank you so much for pointing out that it is not published in English as I was going to purchase it tomorrow as a gift for my best friend. I think I need a few early nights before endeavouring to purchase anything on-line! Please let me know if you have any further luck in finding an English copy as I would dearly love to purchase a copy.
I too, would love to have an English translation. Ideally, I would love Mr Carluccio to do this and publish it with a facscimile of the original as a boxed set.
I absolutely loved this program. I am part of a reenactment group, where I do a lot of cooking from original texts like this. I have not come across this text before and would also be very interested in a copy in English.
I recently watched this BBC production on a United flight -did anyone ever find a English translation for the cook book The Opera…???
apparently terence scully has done an english translation of the book.