Mimi Thorisson is a mom, a chef, an international nomad, a nonna wannabe, and a cookbook author. Known for her envy-inducing life with her family in the French countryside (including two beautiful French cookbooks), Thorisson and her brood decided to move to Italy, a country whose culinary traditions had a siren call she simply couldn’t resist.
Leaving her idyllic farmhouse behind, Thorisson and gang embarked (are still embarking) on an epic journey across Italy, finding regional cuisine gems, historical food traditions, and the many, many wonders that Italian food has in store. The culmination of that journey is Thorisson’s new stunning cookbook, Old World Italian: Recipes & Secrets from Our Travels in Italy. The book follows the Thorisson family from the mountain straddled towns of Piemonte to the lush farmlands of Abruzzo to the endless wheat fields of Sicily.
“Old World Italian” is a travelogue about food and a cookbook about travel, and somewhere in between are easy-to-follow recipes that will help you vicariously venture through Italy during a time when getting to the country is nearly impossible. We wanted to know more from the intrepid author, so we sat down (over Zoom) with Thorisson to learn about the book, her thoughts on Italian food, and how it differs from French cooking techniques.
Let’s start here. Why was Italy calling to you and what was the genesis of your cookbook?
Italy has been like our second home. For holidays at first for the last 16 years with my husband but also before when I was small with my family. Of course, we love the food, and over the years, we've just made so many friends and worked and collaborated with different chefs and people in the food industry and farmers. Every time we went, I started doing projects and we found ourselves in Italy more and more. The year we moved, we had been here eight times in the last six months. So, the book was just a revelation. The idea was born during one of these back and forth trips and it just made so much sense because there was so much good food to talk about, to cook, and people to talk to, that it was an organic kind of thing. We just had to do it.
I really loved how you handled the Roman pastas. What do they mean to you and how did you think about the recipes?
Those recipes meant the most to us, seeing as they're so emblematic of the Roman past with the trio of carbonara, cacio e pepe, and pasta alla gricia. I think if you write a recipe and make it sound so complicated there's no excuse for it. There's always a way of writing it where everybody gets it. And I think that's what I've always tried to do is try to convey that message as simply as possible.
What are you trying to say in your cookbook and what do you want people to take away from it?
I want people to know that, first of all, it's what we love about Italy. So, it's a very personal take on what we love about the country. And what we want to say is really, this is us. This is what we do as a family when we're in Italy. Like today for example, for lunch we went to Antica Trattoria della Pesa in Milan and they shared quite a few recipes in the cookbook. And it was quite emotional because we haven't seen them since February before the lockdown, it's been really tough. Restaurants are suffering greatly. And to give them the book and holding it, like we wanted to hug each other but we couldn't because of Covid rules and all. This is the message of the book – it's us as a family and what we've been doing since our kids were babies. It's what we love about Italy and we hope that we showed our readers what it is. In its way, it's mostly about the simplicity because the recipes are all classics more or less. And it's what we love and that's Italy. It's love and family. And this is what the Thorisson’s like to do when they're in Italy. It's that message, it’s what we love.
Have you decided to make Italy your permanent home or are you still nomadic no matter what?
We're quite nomadic but we feel the warmth of Italy and the hospitality here. We have eight children in total and five full time at home, and for us, the love for family, kids, dogs, a rowdy family like us, it's very welcoming. And as much as I love France and you know being French, and Chinese, but with a strong French identity, I have to say the contrast is comforting and there's something about the grass is greener on the other side as well. But you know, we've been living in France for a long time and I think it was a new chapter that was important and sometimes you have to experience these kind of things in your lives and it's not easy to move an entire family but the warmth in Italy is incomparable. We really love it and we feel very at home here.
One of the most interesting things in your book was when you talked about stocks. Can you describe why stocks are so important what you use them for?
I think when you are cooking all the time, whether for a group or for your family and friends, stocks enhance everything. It's the basis of cuisine. When you make a risotto you have stock, with a soup you have stock. And I think that to really cook well you should always have stock in all forms like you know, cubed up in the freezer, in individual bags. It's just the backbone of taste in a sauce or in risotto or in a soup. So, it's so important, and having that will elevate your cuisine. Also, it’s a very good way to use up everything so it's very sustainable because whenever you have like dead carrots and celery, you just put it all in the stock so it's a way to recycle your kitchen and elevate your cooking. So yeah, very important.
Obviously, you love pasta and you speak about it with so much love in the book. What are your favorite pastas to make?
Oh, it's all very seasonal. But one thing that I love is bitter vegetables. So, when I came here, I actually discovered tenerumi, which are the leaves of the zucchini. And there are tons of them in the beginning of summer. So, those leaves are a bit bitter and they go so well in pasta and mixed with a little bit of burrata, mozzarella, grilled tomatoes, roasted tomatoes, etc. What I love also is this contrast of being such a French cook and using these typical vegetables that you wouldn't find every day in the French market. So, yeah I love cooking with these seasonal vegetables that just pop up in the market and they have such a strong Italian identity and they're so delicate and so representative of Italy.
I want to dive a little bit into the differences between French and Italian cooking techniques. Can you talk about the differences for you and what you like more or less?
Yeah, it's quite different. I think that sometimes I can find more similarities with Italian and Chinese cooking. I mean, you know, talking about dumplings, soups, broths and things like that, but this is only because I'm half Chinese. But yes, the difference I would say is how much butter I consumed before I moved. I think that is a very big difference because France is all about sauce, and just building up a beautiful sauce and reduction with your meats and whatever you were braising. In Italy, first and foremost, the ceremonial making of pastas is already very unique compared to France. Just the whole art of making pasta for me was very important and very different for me. But you know, French people they fetishize food but in Italy, it's all about family. It's cooking for the family. It's a celebration.
One of the things I find most interesting about the originality of Italian cuisine is just looking at bread by itself and how different it is across the regions. Do you have thoughts on that?
Wow, that's very interesting. I totally agree with you. It's like Florence and Tuscany, and especially Tuscany, they like to soak their bread up with sauces and soups which isn’t exactly to my taste. Northern Italy has fantastic crostini crunchy little breads. But then there's a new culture now in Milan, where so many talented bakers are making sourdough and there's a new culture of bakeries opening and they're fantastic. Oh, and then you have the Ligurian focaccia, which is wonderful with a lot of olive oil in it and it’s a different type of bread and is just unbelievable. And then this summer we spent three months in southern Italy finishing the book and I was amazed at the talented baking skills in southern Italy. In Sicily, the bread is amazing there, and wherever you go their brioche buns are incredible. They know how to bake breads. It's completely different to the rest of Italy.