"Gravy runs in my veins. Tomato gravy. The kind that starts out at 8 a.m. on a stovetop and is still gently bubbling away come 5 p.m., slippery with fat from meatballs and sausages braised to unparalleled levels of tenderness. I am only half Italian, but it is certainly the louder half, descended from uncles who pounded a dinner table to punctuate a sentence, a grandfather who made wine in his basement, and a grandmother who wielded a wooden spoon like a scalpel in the kitchen and a cudgel everywhere else."
"Red sauce was the constant. Not just tomato sauce, but red sauce: the dishes, decor, drinks, shouted conversations, and emphatic personalities that make up the ineffable experience of Italian American culture. It began around 1900 with waves of immigrants from across Southern Italy, whose traditions melded and continued to evolve in American towns and cities. It is red-checkered tablecloths, long-simmered sugo, red wine, bitter greens, thin-crust pizza, Parmesan, pasta, and olive oil."
Red sauce and Italian American food traditions define multiple generations and daily life in Little Italies. Long-simmered tomato gravy, braised meats, and family-made wine anchor gatherings, milestones, and rituals. Immigrant waves from Southern Italy reshaped ingredients and created a distinct Italian American cuisine of red-checkered tablecloths, sugo, bitter greens, thin-crust pizza, Parmesan, pasta, and olive oil. Neighborhood markets and streets, like Philadelphia's 9th Street Italian Market, preserve sensory memories and community vibes. A parent retraces family culinary routes on an East Coast road trip with two children to reconnect with intergenerational flavors, places, and cultural identity.
Read at Bon Appetit
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]