A Short History of Spaghetti with Tomato Sauce

A surprisingly wide-ranging journey into the story of this beloved dish and "an utterly fascinating discourse on food history" ( The Daily Beast). Intellectually engaging and deliciously readable, this is a stereotype-defying history of how one of the most recognizable symbols of Italian cuisine and national identity is the product of centuries of encounters, dialogue, and exchange. Is it possible to identify a starting point in history from which everything else unfolds—a single moment that can explain the present and reveal the essence of who we are? According to Massimo Montanari, this is just a myth. Historical phenomena can only be understood dynamically—by looking at how events and identities develop and change as a result of encounters and combinations that are often unexpected. As he shows in this lively, brilliant, and surprising essay, finding the origin of spaghetti—or anything else—is not as simple as it may seem. By tracing the history of the one of Italy's "national dishes" —from Asia to America, from Africa to Europe; from the beginning of agriculture to the Middle Ages and up to the twentieth century—he reveals that in order to understand our own identity, we almost always need to look beyond ourselves to other cultures, peoples, and traditions. "Montanari's research will delight readers and provide plenty of fodder for dinner-table discussion." — Booklist "Full of delicious details." — Publishers Weekly

From legend to history — the myths surrounding the world’s favourite dish, debunked THE MYTHS SURROUNDING THE WORLD’S FAVOURITE DISH, DEBUNKED Did Marco Polo bring pasta back from China, or is that a myth? How did the Neapolitan “macharoni” turn into the ubiquitous spaghetti? Is it even an Italian dish? Hundreds of shapes and thousands of recipes give expression to the culture and products of the country’s regions. But spaghetti with tomato sauce remains Italy’s identity dish par excellence. Massimo Montanari goes in search of the dish’s true origins, tracing its history along the multiple, intricate routes taken by its raw ingredients to merge and become a distinctive element of culinary tradition. It took almost two thousand years and input from the Far East, the Arabic world, and the Americas, for the dish to take centre stage. Its development is the result of chance encounters, unplanned exchanges, and unpredictable intersections. As we dig in search of spaghetti’s origins, we find its strands wrap right around the world. “Learned and entertaining.”–Il Giornale