Breaking Bread with Tom Papa - Episode 116 - Katie Parla

Episode Date: August 2, 2022

Katie Parla is a New York Times Best Selling cookbook author based in Rome where she is waiting for me to deliver bread to her!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hey, don't you know? Hey, it's also a show. Hey. Hey, everybody, welcome to another edition of Breaking Bread with Tom Papa. I am Tom Papa. We have a good show for you today. You're going to enjoy this conversation with Katie Parla. I became aware of Katie Parla, a very prolific writer involved in over 30 different cookbooks. back when remember we talk with Dan Richer from Rata Pizza and his pizza cookbook that was maybe six months ago or so. The other name on that book was Katie's. Katie is amazing writer. She has so many good cookbooks. One of them I'm going to lean into a little bit more than the others.

But that Dan Richer cookbook on pizza, which is, and I promised, and I, and I, and I, I mentioned on this, my failing, that I was not getting, I hadn't cracked it open. And I really felt like maybe I was a bad host and bad dough maker. If I have this great pizza Bible and I'm not getting into it. And when I spoke with Katie, it inspired me to do it. And it's so well laid out. And the stories are so great. And Dan is very, very detail-oriented. So the combination of that with the great writing of Katie, created this really great, great book. And Katie also is, you know, we all of these fantasies of what our life could be and where we could go and what we could do. And Katie came from New Jersey and went to Rome as a teenager and decided, I'm going to live in Rome.

Just one of those completely inspired moments that don't really happen all the time. and she jumped on it and followed through and made her teen dream come true. And this interview actually took place with her from Rome. And, you know, that just excites me to no end. I really want to be her friend so I can have a real good food contact in Rome. And after this conversation, I think I did it. I think I might have pulled it off. I am coming to you right now in this a little hello and intro from the Jersey Shore where I last spoke to you. I have one more week here after we got through family weddings and birthdays and all of these crazy celebrations. Now, and also last week since we spoke, I had to go off to Chicago and host Wait, Wait,

Don't Tell Me again. And not have to, but it's fun and it's great. It's a nice opportunity, but I did have to leave the beach. So I feel like the next five days, I might actually have a vacation. This might be the beginning of some vacation. My hot dog count is it around four. My bottles of good red wine has been small. I would say I'd put it maybe around two or three. That doesn't mean I wasn't drinking other things at the time,

but of like this is going to stand out. I would say, yeah, around there. One great Italian restaurant down here that I hadn't been to in probably 18 years, and went back and on Long Beach Island, Columnando's, and the food, you know, we talk about this a lot, how you get consistency in a place for, I don't know how people get consistency for two meals in a row, let alone 18 years of a restaurant that really never lets you down. That is a good spot. So we had some good wine when we went over there and took my parents and had a nice Italian meal,

which was exceptional. And other than that, Hot Dog Island, Taffy Island, and just throwing some Oreos into the beach bag and heading down to the beach. And I feel like this might be my last task right now. This might be my last task. Doesn't really happen, does it? There's really no such thing as a vacation. And, you know, that's the problem. When you really like what you're doing, you kind of feel like I'd rather just go do that stuff.

then just go on a water slide. This podcast today is brought to you by tompapa.com. Oh, that funny comedians got a whole bunch of shows coming up. I'm doing a run of clubs all through August. I'm going to be heading out to Brea, California, and Salt Lake City at Wise Guys. Love that place. Going to Tempe at the Improv and going to Honolulu at the House of Blues. and then the fall we've got a bunch of theaters coming up go to tompapa.com all that stuff is there and this is all leading up to

uh October which will be uh the time when I will be shooting my my next special so this is all leading up to that so if you want to come out and be a part I would I would appreciate it I'm just looking at my background now how it's very beach house I see a towel I see some fruit that no one's eating because everyone's eating Cool Ranch Doritos, a bottle of wine. I see that over there. Yeah, this is definitely not your common background if you're looking at this on the YouTubes. All right, Katie Parla, let's jump into it. I really want you to meet her. The book that I was mentioning that I wanted to lead into a little bit more than the others, and go to katyparla.com, and you'll get all of her stuff. She has walking tours in Rome. You can see her TV and video clips

and all the list of her books. But the food of the Italian South I bought immediately. And it is like the Italian South that really isn't traveled all that much. Some parts of it are. But she also got some tiny little villages and places and sought out the recipes of the people that are not looking for, you know, notoriety and any kind of fame. And as Katie says, they were even like, why are you here? what are you talking to us for? And she, this is purely, this is good journalism at its best.

She is preserving these recipes from these smaller places, these smaller outpost villages, and put them in this book for us to enjoy and then they'll be there for the rest of time, which is just an amazing, amazing thing. Again, the book is called the Food of the Italian South and it's got this beautiful fauccia with cherry tomatoes on the cover. And I haven't got in and started using them. It just came in after I spoke to her. Already just, again, with all of her books, great writing, it really sucks you in and tells a great story.

And then you can go off when you're ready and start trying to make them yourself. Really cool. She's a very cool person, a really great writer. So enjoy now my conversation with Katie Parla. Well, thank you for being here. I'm excited to have a little time with you. Yeah. All right.

We'll jump right in. What time is it? What time is it in Roma? 7.1 p.m. in Roma. Ah, perfect. Perfect. Almost 100 degrees. Ooh, really?

A little warmer than I'd like, but that's fine. Oh, man. Well, you did, where in New Jersey did you grow up? I grew up in Mercer County in a town called Princeton Junction, which people here called Princetona. So not super far from Passaic. Yes. And I went to Ryder College.

Love it. Just down for one. That's amazing. Yeah. I always say that it has the distinction I always describe it as down the road from Princeton. Yeah. Well, it's an amazing thing because I have Jersey roots as well, as you know. And I went to Rome for the first time only five, six years ago.

And you did the thing that everybody in their mind kind of flirts with when they travel to someplace that they fall in love with. They're like, oh, what if we were to live here? What if we just stayed? And you actually did it. Yeah. But I mean, I decided when I was. 16 when my brain wasn't like fully formed. And so I even, I had even less sort of fear and

certainly no responsibilities at the time. So I was like, I'm going to move to Italy when I grew up. That's what's happening. I'm a sophomore in high school. I understand everything clearly about that decision. And then when I moved here, I was like, eh, I want to stay. It's hard, but I'll figure it out and make it happen. And then there was all the pizza, of course, so I had to stick around. Yeah. So how long between, so at what age did you do that? That was after college, right? Yeah, after college. So I moved here when I was 22.

So almost 20 years ago. Yeah, it's been 19.5 years. Very exciting stuff. Yeah, big anniversary coming up in January. Yeah, that is a big thing. Yeah. God. Why did you, why?

So at 16, you actually visited? Yeah, so I went to, like, one of the rare public schools with a Latin program. Oh. And so, like, the Latin teacher took us on this trip. And it was on a bus and we all had matching backpacks and everyone got pickpocketed four times. A lot of the 13 city eight-day bus tour was spent in gift shops or in traffic. So it was like maybe not that ideal romantic trip to Italy. And we stayed in like a super sketch neighborhood in Rome.

But I was like, this is really cool. And I want to live here. And there was like gelato and stuff. So I was like, I was particularly pumped. And then, yeah, like going back to New Jersey and I was like, mom, dad, like, I'm moving to Italy. So I enrolled in Mercer County Community College night classes of Italian. And they were like, okay, you're weird. But then I just kept with it.

And but always with that, like, when I grew up, I'm moving to Italy and like, you know, worked 100 jobs in college to fund that dream. God, that's so great. I love this focus. It's so to have that focus at 16 is. crazy. I highly recommend making one life decision and just like never, never straying from it. It seems so much more impressive than having a plan. Right. Exactly. Like floundering around. I just read in one of the one of your books that you always thought your family was from Naples.

Yeah. You know, I like I encounter people all the time and you probably do too that they know that their family immigrated to New York through Ellis Island. from Italy and that's kind of like the extent of the knowledge, which is crazy because my family came over, you know, 120 years ago, a few generations. But, you know, everyone like who packed up and left these really remote rural towns departed from some big city in Italy, Bari, Palermo, or Naples, and then they, like, didn't want to talk about anything that they left behind. It was pretty painful. So, yeah, get this like, hey, I'm Italian. Like, that's, I, I always. I always felt like I was Italian when I was growing up because in Jersey, you identify with like wherever your grandparents came from.

Right. But yeah, we were not, we are not from Naples. We're from like a 70 to hour donkey ride from Naples. Oh, man. Tiny, tiny. It's so funny. Yeah, it really connected with me because we always said Naples also that one of the grandparents came from Naples. And then it's slowly, when people just started digging in a little bit more, it's like, no.

We actually weren't from there at all. No, completely. And what's so interesting, a lot of people, I think for, especially in the past, like, six to seven years have been pursuing their Italian dual citizenship. Yes. Which is like, it's a crazy law that the Italians pass. And I'm pretty sure it's athletically motivated, like, to get South American soccer players with Italian heritage onto the national team. But if you can demonstrate that you're, like, descended from a real life Italian, then you can be given a. passport and in fact you know my great-grandfather was born in palermo the italian government gave me a passport but through that research yeah and it requires like very little effort you're like oh no all the things that i believed about my heritage are wrong yeah uh not from that place not not even my real last name um oh really not even your last name yeah it was parlo so not like

radically different but yeah you know whatever it's the all big deal yeah and It's difficult because we actually, the same thing. We were like, we should get our dual citizenship and we should start tracking it down. And then it was like, this is going to be more difficult than we thought because we don't really have a lot of real accurate records. And everything was handwritten. We thought Palermo also. And then it turns out somebody just like two months ago was like, no, is Katania. Oh, that's like, oh.

That's part of Blarmo. Right. Yeah. So is, do you have? have to pass a language test to get the dual? You know, I don't think so. Certainly when I was granted citizenship, no. I think that now there's like a language requirement,

maybe for spouses. Okay. Of the like Italian citizenship recipient, but that's like a new, that's a new law. Right. But yeah, it's like here, do you have Italian blood? Here's a European passport. Please take this.

Man, I really want to do it. I want to do it. I don't know what's stopping me. I don't know if it was just the confusion or just that I hate forms. I'm not really sure. Well, we do we do forms really, really extensively here. We're prolific in forms. So yeah, that'll put you off for sure. So why did you pick, why did you pick Rome? I mean, I love decaying civilizations. And Rome has. has been slowly collapsing since around, you know, 350. Yeah. And I think I just like, you know, like Istanbul's another favorite city of mine. I love, you know, Los Angeles, New York, like these places that had like a kind of a golden age and aren't there anymore and are visibly deteriorating. And I think it's so fascinating like all the tensions that create that. Yeah.

Plus I'm really into pizza. And so while Naples is perhaps the most famous pizza city in Italy. Finally, Rome has a lot more pizza styles. So I was like, yes, this is my place. Well, what was your experience when you came to Rome? Do you enjoy it? I loved it. You know, we did kind of the classic Rome, Florence, Tuscany, Venice, you know.

And I came away thinking those places were great. Tuscany is its own thing, but as far as cities, like those cities were great, but they were kind of museums. They were kind of just, you just kind of just kind of. kind of walk through and observe everything that was where Rome felt alive. Rome felt like you had all of that. You had all of the decay that you're talking about, which is so great. And they just build on top of the decay and keep going.

But I really just felt like it was alive. It felt more New York to me that there were people actually living for today. Totally. And, you know, people always ask me, is tourism the biggest industry in Rome? No, not even close. It's the bureaucracy. And they're like, you know, a solid million people here who work for the government at some level. And then probably 300,000 university students.

So even if there weren't any tourists, the city would still survive and still have its identity. And a lot of, you know, of course, if you're eating like with the Coliseum view, like the food's probably disgusting. But if you just do like a little bit of investigation and research and if you walk, you know, if you take Metro two stops from the Coliseum, you're in a super. distinct Roman neighborhood like testacea, which has a very deep pride about its cuisine and a real character that feels unique to itself within the city. So I think that's, I think that's so cool. Yeah, that's that was the thing that it was like, okay, this was, I felt all of those things, but I was like, I don't really understand. It's like going in New York and someone tells you, just go to the West Village and that's all you do, you know, and you're like, you find a couple

places and it gives you that taste. But it was like, oh man, you really should come here, rent an Airbnb for like two months and just kind of immerse yourself just into like the daily life of it all. That's kind of the minimum, I think, because a lot of people come through for a month and they're just acclimating after that first month. And what's cool is like, if you stay for just a week and you are renting an Airbnb and staying in a neighborhood and you go to the same cafe or market vendor every day, like you're instant. a local, right? People recognize you.

They say hello. They're a little bit more generous with their discounts at the market stalls. But, yeah, two months, like, you really can insert yourself into the rhythm of a district and really into the city. And it's so much fun. So that's good advice. I recommend two months is good. Right.

I'm going to follow you. I'm just going to show up. You're like waiting outside you think. I had a cool thing where we had this. when we first got there, this young Roman taxi driver picked us up. And my family sat in the back and I sat in the front next to him. And his eyes got really big. And he's like, oh, my God.

Oh, my God. Verdoni. I was about to say that's, yeah, I knew that was coming. And I was like, what are you talking about? And he thought for sure I was this great comic actor, a famous actor in Italy. And he would not believe me that I was not Carlo Verdoni. He thought I was, he called his family and wanted me to talk to them.

And then he started to realize I knew very little Italian. I mean, frankly, I don't believe you when you tell me that you're not Carlo Verdoni. But likeness is like truly stunning. It's weird, right? Yeah, it's intense. But you should, you can use that to your advantage. I would leverage that likeness all around Rome. I know.

Exactly. And he said he wrote down, it was great, and then we kind of had this great ride. And he wrote down this word, die. Yeah, die. Yeah. And I haven't found anyone else that knew that word. Yeah. Daya is a very Roman word. First of all, it has a J in it. And when you take Italian class, they're like, first rule, there's no J in Italian. You're like, okay, cool. And then you get to Roman, everyone's throwing Js everywhere. But Dia is like, let's go. here we go come on yeah you hear it a lot like if someone's trying to like encourage you or romance just they sprinkle it through their daily life all sometimes for no reason it's just it's such a like roman phrase a real staple right just kind of like a older it's not even like a it's not even a curse word and it's and it's really beloved by them so yeah that's very strange yeah that was it was so great and he wrote it down and i still have like in one of my books just the way he wrote wrote it with the Jay.

And I would say to just like Italians and other spots or and I would think I was like trying to get some street cred and they were like, what are you saying? Well, it does need a little bit of context. Yeah, right. Yeah, exactly. So I, you, your love of pizza, I don't know where to begin. I mean, you grew up in New Jersey. So, there's pizza all around us.

Right? So much pizza. So much pizza. I mean, mostly in my town, it was like New York style pies. Right. I went to like, I think Al John's pizza every day after school for like 10 years. Right. And only in high school did I start like dabbling in the Trenton pies?

Right. I was like, whoa, that's so delicious. And a whole new thing. Yeah. But then I went, I went to Yale. So moved to New Haven where I was surrounded by so many. pizzas all the time and worked at a pizzeria. Where did you work?

I worked at bar. At bar? Yeah, which is like a, it's a, they're like, their website's so funny. It's like bar nightclub.com because I think it really wanted to be like a very popular trendy nightclub, but instead it was just a delicious pizzeria with like good beer. So they failed at their initial plans. but it's the pizza's great. It's amazing.

I just love the, I just love the idea that there's like these managers trying to make it a nightclub. And there's a chef in the back just like, this will be about pizza. But what's so funny is the pizza guys were like some of the most dangerous people in New Haven. Like, they were terrifying. And they weren't particularly passionate about dough or fermentation. They just could really like,

they could really nail a thin crust pie with some clams on top, which is a New Haven classic. They did the stoner special, basically, like a potato and mashed potato and bacon pizza that was like so legendary. Oh my God. They're still breaking out good pies, but they have a small dining room compared to the vast nightclub, which is like now behind a curtain. It's so bizarre. Like surely bad things have happened back there. But it's a weird fun place. It's great.

Yeah. I just started this book. I don't even remember, Deacon's Deacon Bishop or something. And the first description is the guy talks about it's all taking place in the projects. And they describe the Italians. Nobody really went out from the projects because there were the Italians who, just like you're describing, were just so scary in a way that people didn't understand that they didn't even want to go out and leave their homes and interact with these guys. I've had some Italian experiences like this. The first time I went to Naples, it was like the

middle of August and the only people on the street were like, topless men wearing like wool pants and slides. And I was like, I don't know what's going to happen to me here. No. I don't know what's going to happen. I've heard that about Naples. I heard Naples can be pretty rough. It's the coolest place. You kind of have to devote yourself to like loving it because at first it's shocking. It is insane and super chaotic and just like so much energy. If you're not in that headspace, then you're like, get me out of here. Or if you just walk out of the train station and someone tries to sell you like an iPad, you're like, what is happening?

I'm trying to eat a pizza. Why are you doing this to me? And it's clearly like a brick wrapped in like an iPad. So it's a bizarre. bizarre alien universe and it's so great. You got to go there with what it likes it. Yeah. Is it the food that's great or is it just the whole thing?

It's the whole vibe. It's the energy. Once you get past all the guys trying to like sell you stolen things and like fake electronics, then you're in the heart of what used to be the ancient Greek city and then the ancient Roman city and then essentially the capital of like a major kingdom. So it was one of the richest and most private. prosperous places on the planet.

And so remember when I told you I like urban decay? Yeah. Naples next that box because you walk down, especially the main street in the center, which is called Via de Tribunali. It's where all the famous pizzerias are, especially Sorbilo di Matteo. And they, you know,

the people that live there are sometimes nobility and sometimes people who are like literally living on street level in one rooms with a dozen people. And it's like everyone's kind of living together and sharing the same space. and energy in a way that's really unique in Italy, which otherwise is like somewhat segregated by social class. So it's that like everyone's packed together.

It's dense. The coexistence of all these people is amazing. And then not only are there wood fired pizzas everywhere, they're fried pizzas everywhere. Fried. Oh, yes. Really? Pizza frita. Pizza frita.

And then they have like along the main street, the one that I referenced earlier, Vire de Tribunali, you've got the sit-down pizzerias and all of them also have like a little mobile cart in front that sells tiny pizzas that you fold in four so they're portable. Or the best thing on the planet, Fritatina, it's bechamel bound like macaroni, studded with cheese and pancetta and then it's like shaped into a hockey puck, shape and size and fried. It's insane. Oh, my God.

Everyone there is a little chunky. It's amazing. That's amazing. Do we like fried pizza? Fried pizza is very good when done really well. And what's interesting about fried pizzas, like the Neapolitan-style pizza that's cooked in the wood-fired oven, that's a man's domain. There are almost no lady pizza only, whereas the origins of pizza frita is 100% women. Basically, like the women on a single block would match up their calendar so no one too close would be competing with them.

And one day a week, they'd open their ground floor dwelling, heat up some oil with a propane tank. Right. And then use dough that they would fill with like little chunks of pork fat. No pink stuff, just like straight fat, pieces of mozzarella, black pepper. And they would, you know, fold it in half into kind of like an envelope and fry it. And it like, it looks like a frisbee. It's so caloric and so delicious.

And that's how they would earn a little extra money at the end of the week. It sounds like a calzone. It's basically like a calzone instead of being baked and spried. Wow. But like really few fillings, like very sparse filling, just basically kitchen scraps that people would put together. Jeez, that sounds amazing. Where was the, what was the, when you say Naples was this very wealthy center, what was Rome while that was? Great question.

While Naples was at their height. When Naples was at its height, Rome was. Rome was still the capital of the papal state. So that was run by the Pope. And the Pope was in charge from about 500 until 1870 with like sometimes periods of stability, often not. And so, you know, Rome is important because we're getting like so biblical now. Peter and Paul were marty here.

So the Pope, like the head of the church has to be here. But otherwise it was like a mucky, malarial snake infested swamp that people didn't really want to live in. but a lot of them had to for work because they worked in the church. Meanwhile, Naples was this port town that was the capital of Spanish noble vice royalties. Like Spain basically controlled all of South Italy. And Naples was their intellectual, commercial center. It was so vibrant.

And like the Bourbons who ran it built like a Versailles like complex in the city and also another outside the city. So you see those traces of what it was when there were. you know, a million people in town. Yeah. Which would have rivaled, you know, London at the time. It was a really sophisticated place. Oh, amazing. You, uh, you, your love of pizza, how, and your Jersey roots, that, I spoke with,

with Dan Richer. Yeah. And, uh, and that was a book that you were involved with. Uh, what's your connection with, Dan? Dan and I have known each other for a really long time. Uh, when I land at, uh, when I land at, Newark to visit my family. My first stop is always Rata because inevitably it's been eight hours since I've had any pizza on my plate. So, you know, we, I think we met maybe 10 years ago. He had just

opened Ratsa and, you know, we had some friends in common and got to spend real time together when he was working with the Marta team in New York and a bunch of people from the Union Square hospitality group came over. And I took them on a piece. eats a tour of Rome and other parts of Italy. That's where we like really bonded. And then, you know, he has been wanting to write a book for a long time. And when the time came, he's like, let's do this. And of course I signed on.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, well done. The book was beautiful. It really is. It was really, really nice. And I could tell from talking to Dan that you had a big hand in it because he seems like he's slinging dough and you're a great writer.

Dan is a very talented person. I wouldn't trust him with a word document. No, he's a brilliant guy and doesn't give himself enough credit for how genius he is. But okay, so this is the thing. I'm good at like writing words on a page. Yeah. In editing and I need a like a concrete object, right? Yeah.

In order to edit the book, I would read him lines aloud. And would read, you know, a paragraph. And he would say, okay, four sentences back, like third word, change that. And I'm like, okay, genius. Really? That's crazy. What? That is your brain work like that? Yeah.

It was impressive to say the least. Yeah. So he's working on a higher plane. And I kind of like could reel him in and put things on paper for him. It makes sense, though, because just the descriptions of the fermentation, and the dough used. Like he's got one of those his, the way that he's thinking

and always trying to perfect his pizza, like he is pretty obsessive. There is that, there is that, maybe he's probably has Asperger's or something. He's, I mean, it's a baker's brain, for sure. And that, like, obsession with fermentation, also like the tactile muscle memory part of it.

It's a really physical job. You know, I make dough all the time, but I'm making, like, maximum five kilos at a time. Yeah. And before he got his, you know, bomb-ass new mixer, which some of your listeners

might have seen on the gram, there was a lot of hand mixing. And it's, you know, when you're in contact with the dough every day, you can see how it develops and changes and you can make improvements. And it's just such a cool process.

So it was amazing to see that because I'd always appreciated the end product. Yeah. And got to spend a lot of time with him in, in Jersey City watching, you know, the whole dough development. Yeah. Yeah, it really is impressive.

And I feel, I feel a little bad. I actually felt guilty when I knew we were going to talk because I swore to him that I was going to follow the book because I've failed at pizza so many times. I bake a lot that I've always failed. And I'm like, I'm going to do it. This is going to be the summer of pizza with you as my guide. And I haven't done it yet. So I'm like, I don't want to.

Yeah. Right. Did you, did you, I was, when I was in Rome, the last night in Rome, I had. had the worst pizza of my life. Oh, I'm so sorry that happened. It was so bizarre. We almost thought, like, this can't be happening. Like, something's, like, they're telling us it's time to go.

Like, we said to it. It's like they didn't know how to make pizza. It was like this raw, round circle of dough with these chunks on it and what seemed like canned tomato sauce. And we're like, how's this happening to us in Rome? It's like getting bad weed in Amsterdam. Yeah, that is tragic to say the least. I'm so sorry that you had to go through that with your family.

And next time you come to Rome, just hit me up. And I've got extensive pizza guides. Yeah. Did you get into baking it yourself? You said you make dough? I make dough all the time. Like, in addition to writing Dan's book, I've also, I've got like, in my own cookbooks, I have, like, bread and pizza chapters.

And I wouldn't say that I'm a dough expert. And I always collaborate with, like, my insanely brilliant baker friends. Yeah. But I, you know, of all the recipes in my books, I'm always making the pizza the most frequently because I've got an uni. Yeah. I love a, I love a project. I love shopping.

And I love hoarding pizza tools. That's honestly what drives me to make the dough is I need the new tool for it. And I need 12 of the same thing. So. It's so funny, isn't it? It's ridiculous. Yeah, we get obsessed. I just talk to these.

barbecue guys. It's the same thing in a different world. It's like the list of tools and stuff that you can get is so addicting. So many things and you get like sometimes I get distracted with like the hacks. Like now I'm going to do the DIY ones. Like no, now I'm going to spend 500 bucks on proofing containers that don't even fit in my fridge. So that makes a lot of sense. It's very silly. But it's fun. The book that I haven't read that I just glance through online that I'm very interested in is uh was southern southern living food of the italian south food of the italian south is that what it was yes there you go there you go couch on the cover yeah um yeah so that that book is all about basically naples all the way south like the lower peninsula yes so probably where your family's from yeah right exactly i think there is some puglia

is that down there? Yeah. Yeah. So explain to me, give me, because you know all things. Explain to me what happened to the South because we know like

in general terms like that it's, that it was poor and a lot of people fled, but why and how and well? I'm going to try to make this as the least boring, most succinct version of this as I can. Basically, in 1861, the South was under bourbon, so Spanish vice royalty power.

And then it fell to the unification movement, which was run by this guy, Victor Manuel I, if you've been to Rome as a giant white wedding cake like building dedicated to him, and every Italian town has like 50 streets and piazza's name for him. So he's coming from the north and was actually not that wealthy, needed the South and neither the South's wealth.

And once he kind of pillages and plunders, he systematically neglects the economic development of the South, but not before he breaks up all the church lands and the noble lands that peasant farmers had been subsisting on. So like that system of rich people owning all the land and a lot of laborers like just surviving is not a great system. Right. But people were making it and getting by in many parts of the South.

But once that system is destroyed and not replaced with anything viable, there's widespread power. and millions of people hit Rome, Turin, Milan, if they could afford a ferry, a boat ticket. They went to New York, Chicago, Buffalo, New Orleans, and got the hell out of the South. Was it pretty quick? Was it like the shit hit the fan? It's time to go? It took decades because you had all of these like major poverty moments. You had rampant malaria all over the South too. And there would be these like outbreaks. There was. it wasn't just like the poverty.

It was also the malnutrition that caused a lot of weak immune systems and plagues to spread. So it was over decades from basically like 1861, the first migration starts, picks up momentum and accelerates through the turn of the 20th century. So for like a good five decades, people were leaving the South. And something that I found out when I was researching the book, of the millions of people that left, about a third repatriated, like went back to Italy. Really? Yeah.

A third. Yeah. Because they didn't want to leave in the first place. They just had to survive. So it's fascinating. And then we have all of this like very like spectacular and elegant food in the South that people say, oh, that's a, that's Kuchina Povera. That's poor food.

I'm like, no, that's like an almond paste sculpture infused with sugar and all sorts of very exotic flavors. Like this is proof of a time. that the South was thriving. Right. And you don't really get that sense anymore unless you visit certain parts like Bari is very wealthy, Lechhe is very wealthy. But yeah, you can drive, you know, from the east to west coast and see villages that are pretty sparsely inhabited and feel clearly neglected by Rome.

Yeah, it was that that one line in the book when you say, where is everybody? Where is everyone? So what was that like to be researching? and going and finding these different dishes and stuff that was there. And there is nobody around. Like, was that difficult? The people who own businesses that I was visiting were very confused. They're like, how did you find us?

It was super, super interesting and felt kind of high stakes in certain areas because I would be making pasta with the two women in the village that still made that pasta shape. And once they pass away, like there's no one else doing it unless someone records it and writes about it. So, you know, with the 85 recipes, like I barely scratched the surface. Right. But I think, you know, one of the motivating factors behind the book was to inspire people to go visit and like, look how easy it is. You can literally walk into any of these places, talk your way into the kitchen. Everyone's happy to have you.

No one is going to keep a secret if they think you're going to cook their recipe and enjoy it. Right. So people were incredibly generous. And so when you go through the book, you'll see a lot of the headnotes or the titles of the chapters are named for the people whose recipes I adapted for the book. Oh, that's great. It really is such an Italian thing, too, because there's a, and I think we even mention it. Like my mother put together all of her recipes because we've, everybody just wanted them. And I tried to pass them on to friends.

And they're like, there's no measurements in this. there's no real specific amounts of anything. Like, you just feel it. You'll get it. No, it's true. Like, a lot of the recipes were just a list of ingredients with the letters QB next to them. QB is Italian for as much as you need. I'm like, oh, cool.

That's vague. I need a specific meat for this. Like, how many ounces are we talking? Give me grams. do it. But, you know, like, no one was hesitant to hand over recipes, but often I would like, I'd be like, okay, well, now can we make them together so that I can actually see how much flour fits in the palm of your hand? Like, what are we working with here? Yeah. How big is your hand? Like, time out. Scoop some flour into this cup and I'll weigh it. Was it, was it, what was it,

when you came away, was it kind of hopeful? Or was it a little bit like, this was good that we got this down because this is going to disappear. Yeah, I mean, I think like every cuisine is in a constant state of evolution. And it's both good and bad that we're not eating the same things today that we were 100 years ago. I mean, there are parts of Italy that only mainly ate corn to the point that it drove people to like literal insanity. So the diversity of ingredients that people have now, the availability of ingredients of ingredients, and a diverse diet that people are now, great. But it also, where do people go crazy from corn?

Oh, this is insane. Okay, so have you ever been to like, you've been to Venice, right? Yeah. Venice and that whole rage in the Veneto. Yeah. Like a lot of the buildings in the Venetian lagoon, one huge complex in particular is an insane asylum for people who overdosed on corn. What?

So corn, this is so interesting too, because corn is introduced by the Spanish from the Americas to South Italy. And in, you know, the 1500, Southern Italian is like, cool, we're go planted next to our other 50 freaking grains over here. And meanwhile, it climbs up the Italian peninsula. We're super poor Veneto and Romagna and Lombardy. We're like, we don't have any crops. Like, let's just grow this. And they grew so much corn and ate so much polenta. It's, it gives you this, like, degenerative brain disease. And you start, like, just kind of, like, just kind of, listlessly wandering. And then you start developing dementia.

And then when you're really in the throes of this illness, which is called pelagra, you start eating dirt and paint. For the iron? Just like your body starts eating whatever it thinks has minerals in it. Because in the Americas, corn was an extamalized. So kind of trade process in a way that it wouldn't deplete all of your B vitamins. if you just eat straight corn,

it's taken all that nutrition out of your body. And so these people in the north, for hundreds of years, we're like, well, a bunch of farmers aren't going to make it. So, but we're not going to change our diet. And so all of these, like, insane asylums all over the north have now been turned into, like, museums or have been repurposed in some way.

But people were, you know, in these places until the early 20th century. Oh, my God. Not an extamilized that corn. It's so crazy that it took that long to connect it. Beyond. Just going crazy with corn. I wonder if that's what's happening in America. I wonder if I wonder if that's why all the high fructose corn syrup and all those corn-based stuff is not rule that out.

It's damaging everybody's brains here. Everyone's got brain damage. Checks out. Well, my God, that's insane. So. It's so crazy. Yeah. I'm really excited about that book, though, because it's the fukasha.

I literally just nailed after all this years of baking bread. I just had like my best faccia. Just because I always, I always picture faccia as being this quick, simple. You could just do it in a couple hours kind of bread. And it really takes two days if you really want to have it nice and airy and beautiful. Yeah. Yeah. But the picture on the cover.

is so perfect. Yeah, it's a cast iron foccia, because the model for it is Fokacha Badese, which is in Bari, they basically, they drench a cast iron pan

with oil and then put the oil, already like oil-rich dough into it. And then let it relax and kind of settle and absorb more oil. And then it's cooked in a super hot oven. My oven,

well, I've got an uni now, but the home oven gets to 500. And I couldn't get that crispiness on the bottom. So we decided to like develop a new way. You cook it for the first three minutes on the stove top. And you fry the bottom. Right. And then you move it to the oven.

So you get that like gorgeous, oil rich golden, golden undercarriage. And then the top rounds in the oven. It's very good. Oh, so smart. I had the uni and I just kept lighting stuff on fire. Everything just kept catching on fire. Yeah. I burn a lot of pizzas in it.

It's hard to nail the exact temperature, but I like, I like running it really low. And actually Dan Richer, when he does his uni bakes, he'll like preheat for like 30 minutes at the highest temperature, which is probably around 900. And then put the pizza in and turn it off.

Ah, smart. And then play with it. So in the end, it's probably baking it closer to 650 or 700. Right. which is, yeah, which you still need it because you're not going to get that in your kitchen. But man, I was like, it's pizza night. And then just things are bursting into flame.

And the kids are like, the burnt parts, not that good. It's bitter. Yeah. It's about managing that heat, which is, it's always tempting. If you have something that can go to like 11, why not go to 11? Right. I want to run it at a 6. Yeah.

Yeah. Do you, I mean, you've been there 20 years now. How often do you come back? And what is it ultimately like? Like to have grown up this Jersey kid and now you're there. Do you feel like you have two countries? Do you feel like you have one country? No, I feel like I have two for sure.

I always go back around the holidays and then, you know, I usually go on like insanely aggressive. of book tours. So I get to also remember what different parts of America are like. Right. I get to eat all over the U.S., which is really fun. And there used to be much like greater culture shock because I would spend so much time early on here just like trying to assimilate and trying to figure out like, how do I not red flag that I'm a foreigner every five seconds. Yeah. Yeah. And then like that I would have to go home and like relax, you know, and it's hard to switch between those. Yeah.

But it's a bit more seamless now. And my Italian friends are always like, are you insane? Because I go home in August for Jersey tomatoes. Yes. They're like, you idiot. Like, there are tomatoes everywhere here. I'm like, you don't have beefsteaks in Italy. So don't talk to me about this.

You are not informed. No, exactly. We're literally going down to the Jersey Shore in August. And we did it one year. And then the pandemic. And we're doing it again this year. My sister grows, has a farm up in Clifton. Oh, wow.

Yeah, and we're taking all the tomatoes and we really, we go underneath the house and we get out the big pot and we're going to start canning the tomatoes and stuff. We really feel like we've, without even researching it, we've found our roots. You're real Italians. That feels like such an August thing you do. The whole day. Everyone's going to the beach and doing stuff and we're just in there like stirring these tomatoes and canning them. And it's the best, though. there's something visceral about it.

It really is. You fight over how many bottles each family gets. Yes, we do. And I always lose because I go back to L.A. And to like to ship them as a thing, I was just given. Yeah. Like you guys just take it. I knew.

I knew it. Did any of your family follow you? No, they refuse to move in with me. Really? Yeah. Yeah. But I get, you know, I get to visit them a couple of times here. And, you know, like, they love Rome, but they're kind of like over it.

So we'll meet somewhere else. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, you know, my mom in particular will come over and we'll do like some time in Portugal or Spain or France. And it's nice to be able to do with some of that travel. Because otherwise, I would just like travel all over Italy and never go anywhere else. Yeah, I know.

Well, you could spend an entire lifetime just doing that. It's really true. the thing that's funny when you say like they're over it but you're probably not and like because you love it it's the same way then I would always feel about New York it was like I don't any of the complaints that people have about this it's the weather or the the crowds and all that that never resonated with me I was like no same all those complaints are just they do not bother me in the least because this place is so great totally I'm like what do you mean you don't want to come to Rome and sit in traffic for two hours when it's 100 degrees. That's crazy. Crazy talk.

Screw the beach. We got a beach in New Jersey. This is what we do. People do dump out of Rome, though, right? August is, uh. Yeah. I mean, so when I moved here, yeah, everyone would leave for August. And then that that stopped with like, you know, financial crisis and all of that. And Italians, I would say, are traveling less and less abroad. So we'll rent a house near Rome for the summer and just commute certain days of the week to work. So like, and that's happened earlier than ever this year. So it's, yeah, like my neighborhood in particular, which is like pretty residential. Oh my God, this is so funny.

I know all of the people in my building are on vacation because the floor in my apartment is hot. And because no air conditioning is on anywhere except in my apartment. So it's just like hot Roman air rising through five floors. Oh, man. Like, everyone's out of town. That's hilarious. It's so disturbing. Yeah.

I love that about New York, too. It was like, oh, you finally just got the city to yourself. It was nice. Like, you could just buzz around. And it was like, everyone's in the Hamptons. And down at the beach is like, no, but this is pretty great right now. Yeah. And actually, July is the hottest month here. Oh, yeah. So it gets a little cooler in August. So sometimes I get like a week or two in August. And I'm just like, this is heaven. No one's around. I have the city to myself. It's a cool 96 degrees. So 10 degrees cooler than last month. I'm killing the game. It's a blast. Yeah, it's great. So what's the next book you're working on? Food of the Italian Islands. It's coming out in March, 23. Oh, man. And I'm actually leaving. leaving in 10 days to shoot it with Ed Anderson, the same photographer.

It's the same team as Food of the Italian South. So it'll look the same and very nice on a bookshelf. Oh, cool. And we're doing, oh my God, Tom. The itinerary is crazy. We're like hitting so many islands. We're going to, we're going to circumnavigate Sicily. We're going to hit all these like crazy mountain towns in Sardinia.

We're going to Ponzo, which is this little. island off the coast of Rome where they used to like exile, promiscuous, imperial family members, but it's like so beautiful and so cool. Yeah. And we're hitting Pontellaria, which is this volcanic mountain

off the coast of Tunisia, but is actually part of Italy. We're doing it up. We're going to eat so much pasta. Oh, that's amazing. Are you doing Katania? Will you be in Katania? Yes.

Yeah? Yes. Absolutely. Have you been to Sicily? No, I haven't. You got to do. of it. Yeah, that's what everybody says. Katanya is amazing

because there was a, it's right next to a giant erupting volcano. Like, Etna is constantly spewing ash or lava and it's terrifying. But like the city, it's so scary. The city was like partially covered in the 17th century.

And so they basically just like chipped out all the basalt and then rebuilt the city out of the material that covered the town. It's so it's like, it's got a dark energy. but it's really, really a cool place. Wow, that's crazy. Yeah.

What is you, do you like wine? I don't like wine. I love wine. You love wine. Okay, good. What are you drinking now? I'm drinking a lot of sparkling wine from the Veneto. That's not prosaqo.

So like Spargola from a mini Romagna, which is basically the same production zone as Lambrucco. I'm drinking a lot of chilled Lambrucco. Right. Just bubbles all day. Yeah. Summertime bubbles. Summertime bubbles. With your hot floor.

The hot-ass floor. Yeah. It's perfect combo. Is there any end to what you could write about in just in Italy? No, definitely not. I mean, I haven't even really, I've been writing about Rome for 20 years and I haven't really done it. So, you know, there are parts of Italy. that haven't had anything written about them.

Yeah. Like Molise has been barely covered and it has such a rich culture. I mean, to do these regions full justice, I would have to write multiple volumes on each subzone within the larger region. It's an absolutely infinite person. Yeah. It's really amazing. It's like whenever we think about like, well, we should go back to Europe and it's like,

yeah, but we're just, we've, we've, we've, only just started in Italy. It's like, yeah. Yeah, we really should go like yearly. I concur. Let me know when you plan that Sicily trip. I'll help you out. What is your favorite time of year in Rome?

Oh, late, late October, early November into mid-November are so dreamy because it's still warm during the day. Yeah. The exhibitions and things that were up during the summer season are still going on. you start to get artichokes by mid to late November. The weather's so good. It's not too hot to eat Carbonara every day. It's awesome.

Oh, it's the best. Oh, that's what I wanted to ask you. I was thinking about that this morning, because I have a good friend in New York and we're both Carbonara crazy. Is it okay to have Carbonara with Panchetta? rather than guanchale. Yes. So I've been a lot of...

Okay, so yes, with the footnote that every single Roman chef today will say Carbonara is only made with spaghetti or rigatoni, guanchale, pecorino Romano, black pepper, and egg yolk. Right.

But if you look at the recipes that were being published in the 60s when it starts to develop, they're throwing in, whole eggs. They're using panchetta. They're putting in freaking garlic, dude. Really? All this stuff that would be sacrilege. People like burn down their house if you suggested this. It's true. It was in like adaboni is the Julia child of Italian regional cuisine. She was the one that was teaching everyone about cuisine and she's from Rome. She watched the

development of Carbonara and she wrote about Carbonara with Parmesan and garlic. So the way that people make it today and claim it's been codified is simply rejecting the actual evolution of the dish, which was much more loose and much less strict. Why? It's so funny. It's really become so strict. People are like so passionate if you take any kind of side side avenue to this dish. It's exhausting. It really is. It is. Because I literally was like, I was in a shop like, here in L.A. and there's a place where I can get Guantale, and then there's another place that doesn't have it. It's not that common. And I was like, there's Panchetta there. And I'm literally standing in the aisle with it in my hand, like, will I be, will I be a scourge on my family if I make

a Carbrenara with Pancetta? Like, it's really like the street cred. Will it be, will I just be cheap? Maybe I can make it. And if I enjoy it, I won't tell anyone. I mean, when the first carbonars are being made. It's people who are used to scarcity in the post-war period. Right. We can afford eggs now. So they were still using whatever scraps they had. So Puncetta, knock yourself out. Go for it. You've got permission. And don't let anyone tell you what the real recipe is because they've never read Auduboni. Yeah, Auduboni. I want to look that up. I don't know from Otto Boni. She's got, it's basically now, like,

like a thousand page tome. She's. I mean, she's long gone, but it's maybe 33 editions. She started in the 20s with like this little magazine. It's on newsprint called La Preciosa. And she was like,

hey people from different parts of Italy, here's what other people from different parts of Italy eat and everyone's minds blown. So she's spreading all this knowledge. And her cookbook goes from like this thick. I know this podcast, not a visual medium. It goes from like an inch thick to like a four or five inch thick brick.

And it's a really fascinating cookbook. Not so good on the quantities. If you've got to follow the recipes, you've got to really be intuitive about it. Right, of course. It's funny that the Carbon Arrow makes people so angry when you kind of play around with it. But yet the Caccio Pepe, which is another kind of like simple dish,

people are a little looser with that one for some reason. Yeah, I mean, I think because a lot of people encountered Cacue Peps in the U.S. before they encountered it in Italy, they're okay with different cheese blends and with butter being added to it. Right. And, you know, honestly here, there isn't that much, you know, Cachoy Pepe is just cheese and pepper. Right. There's not that much, like, controversy if someone adds a little Parmigiano to the pecorino mix. Right.

And some of the, you know, finer Cachue Peps here. do and people are very open about it. Right. So, I mean, Concho Pepe is like, it's drunk food, like literally develop to keep people drinking in taverns. Like, in an emergency, like, Giuseppe needs pasta now, like, pull it together. Oh, really? The fast dish.

Yeah. People are more flexible. Yeah, it's like a mac and cheese. It's just like a fancy. Completely. Right. Yeah, I mean, it's a mac and cheese that was served in, there were all these taverns and, like, trotterias in Rome that people would bring their own food to.

Oh, really? And you would drink. And now Romans, I mean, when you were here five years ago, Romans do not get blackout drunk or even visibly intoxicated in the streets anymore, but they used to. They used to anesthetized themselves and had very challenging lives. So going to the tavern and drinking all day into the night was a done thing. So how do you keep people ordering rounds of beer or wine? You feed them mac and cheese.

That's what you do. That's great. Yeah, it's amazing. All right, so one last question. Maybe. There might be two. I'm not sure. I can really talk all day.

How is Rome now? How is Rome? How is Italy? What's the feeling? I mean, we've all kind of gotten a punch in the nose over the last couple of years. And there's a lot of turmoil everywhere, just politically. And you can just feel it. People are searching and trying to get their collective feet back on the ground.

What's the vibe there? I mean, Italy is not stoked on the price of gas or inflation or the fact that for the first time in basically 20 years, there's Euro, US dollar parity. But people are really enthusiastic about the return of travel. They love when you love their country. And the cities have been really, really, really crowded. So like Rome, Venice, Florence have been absolutely. packed. There's also a lot more tourism away from the main urban centers. Like Poolia is absolutely bursting at the scenes with American travelers. Tuscany, as usual,

also very crowded. The other places could use Yibiz. Yeah. So hit up Molesi, Calabria, Sardinia. Right. And yeah, give those people something to celebrate too. Yeah. Yeah. No, that makes a lot of sense. It feels like people, just flood right back to those those big guys, the big headlines. But I think that's what's really cool about your work is that you're really shining a light on these places that people don't go. Doing my best. Yeah, well done, well done.

Well, when you, after you do this big tour and you get all the nice pictures, come back in March and we'll talk again and talk about the new book. I'd love that. And we'll plan your trip to Sicily. Yes, 100%. Yeah, I'm not going to, you're too good of a resource. I'm not going to, you're going to see me a lot, a lot more off air than on. Happy to help.

All right. Really nice to be with you. You too. Take it easy. All right. Take care. Enjoy those bubbles. Sure will.

Chow. Chau. Chau. Arrivederchi. Arrivederechi to you. All right, kids. That's it. That is my conversation with Katie.

I hope you enjoyed her as much. much as I do go to katieparly.com, look up all things Katie, and buy her books. Buy her books. I recommend the Italian South and also the Dan Richer pizza cookbook, another great one. But there's a whole bunch, whatever your tastes are. Thank you so much for listening. Like and subscribe and all that good stuff. Keep spreading the word. Go to tompapa.com. Find my dates. I'm running all over the place. I've got to be near you. I have to be. It's just impossible. and if you can hear my voice, I'm coming to a place near you. All right, enjoy, and I'll see you back from my work life in the regular life next week.