Jewish Cuisine from POLIN: Cook with Alessia di Donato!

In the series “Jewish Cuisine from POLIN,” Alessia Di Donato – an outstanding culinary chef born in Rome – will help you explore the world of Jewish Italian recipes. Follow the steps to prepare mesmerising Italian dishes and enjoy their richness!

A two-way tie links Italian Jewish cuisine with the "purely" Italian one. There are dishes that Italians have enjoyed for centuries without knowing about their Jewish origin, and Italian dishes that Jews have been trying to adapt to kosher rules for centuries. An almost imperceptible line divides these two traditions. It immediately becomes clear, however, that the starting point is always the necessity. We are talking here about cucina povera, about how to get the most out of a minimal amount.

Both traditional Italian and Jewish cuisine experienced historical moments in which difficult living conditions and continuing economic restrictions forced strict savings and the use of basic ingredients which, however, was compensated by creativity and resourcefulness.

Both cuisines use simple products and methods, closely related to the land. As it happens, in Italian regional cuisine, Jewish women knew how to adapt the use, tradition and local products to their own nutritious needs and how to adjust them to religious holidays.

It is thanks to this skill that poor dishes have been transformed into an extremely varied cuisine, full of effusive and ingenious recipes that blend well with regional traditions and a wealth of Belpaese raw ingredients.

Thus, Jewish cuisine in Italy has become the Jewish Italian cuisine, a magnificent combination of traditions, languages ​​and history that enriches the gastronomic system with the extraordinary significance of taste and quality, a true "European heritage".

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