Let me say this clearly. Italian American food is not bad at all. In fact, it’s one of the reasons Italian cuisine became so popular around the world. But over time, some dishes became heavier and more complicated, and a bit of their original soul got lost.
I’ve travelled across the world, and no matter where I go, I always look for Italian food. Sometimes I try it and think… this isn’t quite what we eat back home.
If you want to get closer to real Italian flavours, these 3 simple tips will help you improve your cooking.
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⏱️⏱️TIMECODES⏱️⏱️
0:00 Introduction to Top 3 fixes for Iconic American Italian Food
1:35 Mistake #1: Too Many Ingredients (Less Is More!)
3:13 Mistake #2: Why Pasta Must Be the Star
5:05 Mistake #3: Italian Food Is NOT One Thing
6:41 Final Thoughts: The Secret to Fixing American Italian Food
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🎬 #VincenzosPlate is a YouTube channel with a focus on cooking, determined to teach the world, one video recipe at a time that you don’t need to be a professional chef to impress friends, family and yourself with mouth-watering #ItalianFoodRecipes right out of your very own kitchen whilst having a laugh (and a glass of vino!).
33 Comments
Less is more. And i love Italian food the most. Not what other countrys have made out of it. Like ragu what they call bolognese of pizza. No no not with me 😂 i love originals not fake 😊 i love perfetto, where food make love and people eat with love. Pasta is king and Italy is king and i have the taste of a queen so basta 😊
I agree with all of these ideas. Learning about what makes originals good is a useful tool and expands horizons, the philosophy and the ingredients shape dishes.
great video, promoting real italian cuisine – as you point out, it's easier than all the ingredients too many people feel is needed. i made the mistake of ordering carbonara at one of my city's better italian restaurants and sadly, it was a disaster.
Wonderful, straightforward succinct. An excellent video Vincenzo. What about the Parmo mate?
People make fun of how Italian-Americans pronounce certain words and food, but people forget that its actually a branch of 19th century Neapolitan and Sicilian that has become Anglicised through the prevelance of the English language. Additionally, the "too much cheese" is due to an overload in cheese thanks to subsidising American dairy farmers, so people were encouraged to eat lots of cheese, and sold it at cheap rates as the government was literally running out of space to store the excessive cheese produced by unprofitable, subsidised dairy farms. Much of American food is in fact historically highly influenced by the after effects of lobbying.
Absolutely true less is more , quality ingredIents and 1st class pasta , go long way, and Yes, pasta is in the main role, the souce should act like a spice to pasta
Vincenzo it is true we are both Italian, I’m American and you European, why do you have to always complain. Yes our meatballs are too big. At least we speak our Language where do you get of using English NO ONE in Europe was raised with that.
This is fair. To be honest, sometimes I feel like you're dismissive of Italian-American food and that your perceptions are based on the food at large restaurant chains like "Olive Garden." You are correct that heavy, cheesy dishes are popular at a lot of "family friendly" restaurants, but those aren't representative of all Italian food in the US. My favorite pizza place has been open in the same location since 1934 and is currently run by the third and fourth generation of the same family. 1934! And I have an Italian restaurant no more than 5 minutes from me that serves wonderful Italian food – fantastic bread and cheese and olives and salumi, a separate course for "Paste", and main courses like osso bucco (did I spell that right?) Anyway, in this video I feel like you're being more respectful. I think if you tasted the food at my local restaurant you would approve.
Great points as usual.
In over 20 visits to the US I learned to stay away from Italian food, bread, cheese, chicken and coffee.
They make these things the way they know and enjoy them and that’s fine. They have so many things they do fantastic. It’s not worth wasting great mood.
Vincenzo, before I knew your channel, I thought italian food was nice, but not great because I only had the "fake" Italian Food here in Germany. But now, where I got to know REAL italian Food, I have fallen in Love with it. It is my favorite cuisine by far and I Love the traditional recipes so much! You can not make it better!😋
Dear Vincenzo, I cannot agree with you more! What you point out about the quality of ingredients is valid for all cuisines in the world. I'm not against the fusion cuisine but if one is claiming to cook an original recipe that's what I expect, the original taste and flavour. And I'm not being essentialist about that cause one recipe can differ even around the same region. I follow you and your recipes and keep learning 🥰
I am American with some Italian heritage (my great grandmother was a Bonini), and I love Italian-American food. But since finding your page, I've learned the differences between that and traditional Italian. I love both! The simplicity of traditional Italian is wonderful and I prefer it! But I still love a huge meatball or cream in Alfredo (not in carbonara, though)
Bel video.
Alla fine il segreto della cucina italiana, come dici, è anche la capacità di fare molto con pochi ingredienti, materie prime che però devono essere eccelse, locali, fresche, legate alla regione.
Per questo mi chiedo, ma possibile che in USA non ci siano degli ingredienti di eccellenza che magari noi in Italia non abbiamo altrettanto buoni, con i quali sviluppare la cucina Italoamericana, valorizzandoli e facendole prendere caratteristiche proprie?
Ad esempio, ricordo di aver mangiato un’ottima carne e delle ottime uova negli States.
Secondo la tua esperienza, Vincenzo, quali sono gli ingredienti che hanno specificamente in America, o anche in Australia, che sono realmente eccellenti e che potrebbero dar luogo a ricette che li valorizzino davvero, seguendo la filosofia culinaria italiana?
So well put!
My grandmother was born in Lithuania but came to the US eventually settling in NJ. During my childhood she didn't buy spaghetti sauce in a jare, she bought just cooked tomato sauce from an shop run by an Italian immigrant family. So, it wouldn't have had preservatives at all. My brother married a girl whose father was born in Italy (he mother's parents were immigrants from Italy). Her mother's Italian food was quite different from what is served in US Italian restaurants.
I think the Italian American fault of “too much” Is a broader thing because the US is the land of plenty (excess) I also see the other idiotic trends like tic toc nasty videos making nasty “food” sadly that’s just fools and it’s cross cultural… I LOVE A couple very simple Italian things, Cacio e Pepe, a simple ziti with tomato’s and sausage and I like gnocchi with pesto… simple things are a joy
All foods from all around the world have landed on our shores. We make these foods our own and sometimes it is improvement and we hear no complaints. Look what we did to fried rice and goulash. And Mexican food gets completely destroyed. Taco Bell and no complaints. Could you imagine a Roma Bell? Oh, the humanity! My theory is Italians cannot get past the Mighty Pineapple. Embrace the Mighty Pineapple. Love the Mighty Pineapple. Let the Mighty Pineapple sing Hawaiian songs to you and warm you like the warm Hawaiian pineapple sun.
Would you settle for mango?
Mi piace il Pan alla Milza in Sicilia!
I am a third generation Italian-American. I have since moved back to Europe, though not in Italy, I can see that the simplicity of genuine Italian food is what makes it so good. My wife, who is Dutch, tells me that we eat "poor people's food," just as she and her family were raised on. I call it "the People's food," because the mass of people eat and love it. Keeping things simple is a key.
Oh, and I can never eat mushy pasta. We went with a Dutch group of folks to Italy last year, and many people said that the pasta was not cooked enough. I was so happy that the pasta was al dente, just how it is supposed to be. If I want something mushy, I eat polenta!
PS- Les Izmore was a good friend in High School!
This is a fair and necessary assessment. I agree with #1 completely. Seems like the last few years Americans have been obsessed with seasoning food. But with Italian food it's more of a "less is more" approach in using high quality ingredients that compliment each other.
As an extremely impoverished American, I'm never going to see any of the local places you love. I could sooner become a superhero and carry trains than take a plane to visit other nations. I will sooner become a Roman god than see Roman cuisine with my own eyes. I'm pretty sure this is actually true of most Americans, we're a culture in denial. But what attracts me to Italian food IS that simplicity. If I buy your cookbook you won't tell me to seek out Korean gochujang or Japanese mirin. You'll tell me to eat fresh tomatoes, fresh, possibly even grown from my own garden. Since many, many Americans are as poor as I am and need good food in trying times, I think you might be surprised how bright the future is for nonnas everywhere ready to pass on their craft to us. Thank you so much for your channel and your recipes. I hope other Americans realize how simple, easy, pure and beautiful true traditional Italian cooking is.
What a great video! That was so genuine! It was also so true. The American versions are totally over the top in every aspect. I have eaten Spaghetti just with Tomato Sauce in Rome as the second course as well as pizza Margherita. They are wonderful if they are professionally prepared. You do not need anything else. Hey, maybe you can show us how to make Spaghetti Aglio e Olio? Olive oil, maybe a few chilli flakes!!!!! Wonderful. Keep up the great work and thank you very much. I think the question to ask is why should one comprise great ingredients? Why should you step back? Answer: never.
I think it's rich that the one most known for his prescriptivist claptrap is the one challenging people to "open their minds and their palates." Maybe practice what you preach sometime? The fact that you're recommending these "fixes" to Italian-American cuisine is evidence of how little you intend to understand it. I mean, you've admitted as much in many videos that you "don't want to understand" why American cooks do what they do, so I shouldn't be surprised. That's to say nothing of your attitude towards Filipino cooks.
Some of these suggestions are out of touch. For example, insisting that "each ingredient must be the best quality that you can find" only really works if one has the spare resources to do so. Unless it's a special occasion, I personally would never shell 10 dollars plus shipping and import costs for a 0.3kg of cured pork jowl. I especially find it hard to justify spending 50 dollars for a Guanciale Stagionato Intero. A lot of American-Italian food evolved the way it did BECAUSE getting the "best quality" ingredients was not practical, especially during periods of American history when people were hit hard by recession. And even in periods when such recessions had passed, of course Americans (and especially those with little or no Italian backgrounds) are going to cherish the modified recipes that got them or their predecessors through those difficult times. There's a reason why the iconic $1 pizza slice at 2 Bros (NYC) stayed at that price for so long, and why people mourned when they raised that price to $1.50. But hey, for the sake of soothing the Italian ego, let's all just forget about the people who may not be as well off as those like Vincenzo.
The problem with the "less is more" philosophy is that if the few ingredients you have suck, the dish will suck. People have thus added things that were not usually necessary BECAUSE they know what is accessible to them might not always be the best quality. Don't have guanciale? Get bacon or pancetta and add garlic and cloves, which are two common flavorings found in DOP guanciale. Is your tomato more tart than the usual San Marzano tomatoes? Add sugar to offset the sourness. Why do a soffritto just for those bad tomatoes when that same soffritto can be used in another dish? Add one teaspoon of sugar, or spend however much carrot + onion + celery costs and then spend more time cooking all that down? I wonder what a busy American person just trying to get through life would choose. I'll give you a hint: it's the choice that's convenient and cheaper.
And don't get me started on the prescriptivist attitude towards American ingredients. "Too much cheese!" the prescriptivist said. "How can you go wrong with tomatoes, mozzarella and basil!" Oooh! Purity of Italian ingredients, what ho! It's particularly telling that Vincenzo uses a slice of pizza that has lots of low-moisture mozzarella, because that's the kind of ingredient that he and the likes of people like Lionfield call "plastic cheese" with all the confidence one gets from ignorance. Except, of course, one of the reasons why low-moisture mozzarella was invented was SHELF LIFE, you know, the kind of thing normal people care about. Fresh mozzarella goes bad after a week and must ideally be consumed immediately. Low moisture mozzarella lasts a month unopened on the fridge. But even if that weren't the case, right, was it truly so evil for Americans to like having a layer of cheese instead of splotches of it like what you get from Neapolitan pizza? Does that layer of cheese make the dish less light? Sure. But if a slice or two of pizza was what you were counting on to power you through a day of honest work, you better BELIEVE people wanted that slice to be filling. Oh, and heaven forfend the American just want more cheese.
And there's the insistence that "pasta is the star" and not the side dish. I get that pasta is a primo and meat is a secondo, in Italy but people are allowed to deviate from these Italian norms when they are NOT Italian, kthx. It's especially telling that, to demonstrate his example, Vincenzo's video uses a picture of spaghetti and meatballs. Heaven forfend they have large pieces of meat. Vincenzo has been on the record insisting that the correct way to make spaghetti and meatballs is with small meatballs. Except, the reason why those meatballs are big is because of large household sizes. People had entire families and extended families under the same roof, so when they made meatballs, they had to make them big for the pans that they have. Try cooking small meatballs for a large group and not only will you have to make them in batches, you'd have to faff about repeatedly making those small meatballs.
No matter how much respect you demand of people for your precious pasta, at the end of the day, the person EATING deserves the most respect. And if that person wants a steak beside his pasta, who are you to suggest that it should be fixed? If people want to cook an Italian dish, they don't have to use exclusively Italian techniques, especially if it doesn't get them the result they want. If they want some Maillard reaction on the mince of their Bolognese, no two-bit johnny cap should tell them otherwise. If someone tries to cook Filipino Adobo, and wants to add miso paste or jalapenos on it, there's NOTHING wrong with that as long as they like what they're eating.
Besides, it's NOT like people don't have the room to try authentic Italian cuisine. No, last I checked people had room for your vaunted Neapolitan Pizzas, your cacio e pepes, and whatever other dishes Italy takes pride in. You want people to try cooking it your way? Then maybe don't frame your suggestions as "fixes" that solve "what is missing." Try being less of a jerk. I just don't get why, in your quest to get people to worship the plates your pasta lands on, that you have to denigrate the food of people who have their own cultures and their own ways. It's funny how, in 6:31 of the video, Vincenzo claims that the fixes are not about "saying that one way is bad." His TITLE says "American-Italian food isn't bad." Yet, the video goes on TREATING that "one way" like a "mistake" or an "anomaly" that needs to be fixed.
American-Italian food is not just "not bad," it's good, and has its own regional variations in the US. There is absolutely NOTHING wrong with deep dish pizzas, NYC style pizzas, spag and meatballs, and these other American variations. They are NOT bastardizations, and they are just as valid as the Carbonaras of Rome, the pizzas from Naples, and whatever other dishes are in every region of Italy.
That is the issue – true Italian American traditional recipes do have a history. How they’ve been bastardised since is what is wrong 😢
I think you should do a series teaching us recipes and explaining the different regions they come from. Take us from the North of Italy to the South 👍
"Less is more" was very true in Italian cuisine. I was shocked that some recipes require only 1 allium (either garlic, onion, or shallot only) to fry. The simplicity of ingredients truly work, only if you have the right and/or good quality of it ( so sometimes I add some seasonings to cheat, haha)
Vincenzo, I love you and your work, and you're the GOAT when it comes to authentic Italian. But.
American Italian isn't authentic Italian, and isn't trying to be. American Italian is something different. You're just trying to make it more authentic, which is expressly not the goal.
Agree with everything but I do almost always have a meat with my pasta at the same time. It's just more balanced to have a protein with carbs.
Excellent advice, Vincenzo!! And you said it perfectly: Many foods are "bastardized" in the US, but not just Italian, but also Mexican, Indian, most Asian foods, etc. to "suit the American palate"!
The result? Very cheesy Italian food and Mexican, Indian, Asian food with much less or without any "hot" spices, et. And you're 100% correct about the "too much cheese"! Many people want "extra cheese / extra sauce" on everything Italian!! Sono pazzi! 😜. But thank God there are still some restaurants that cook the "old fashioned way" in the New York area.
I am from Detroit. Back in the 1930's my German-American grandmother learned how to make Italian dishes from her Italian-American neighbor and in term taught her how to make German dishes along with homemade Sauerkraut & Pickles. Food is amazing in how it brings all cultures together!
Many, many Italian nonnas had to adapt to the wishes of their American-born children and grandchildren in how they prepare their dishes. All of us kids wanted meatballs on the spaghetti, so our Italian grandma served it to us that way while she and grandpa ate the pasta first, then the meatballs.
Less is more is definitely the main take away, especially when it comes to pizza. The average American seems to think that the quality of a pizza is decided by the toppings, while every Italian knows that a good quality of the crust, tomato sauce and cheese render the toppings no more than an afterthought.
Being from New York and then going to live in Europe with Italian guys the biggest 4 game changers I learned was:
1) don't overcook the pasta
2) the sauce doesn't need so many ingredients
3) add the pasta to the sauce in the pan before serving
4) DON'T OVERCOOK THE PASTA