Cooking with My Sisters: One Hundred Years of Family Recipes, from Bari to Big Stone Gap

by Adriana Trigiani, Mary Trigiani, Lucia Anna Trigiani

For the Trigianis, cooking has always been a family affair–and the kitchen was the bustling center of their home, where folks gathered around the table for good food, good conversation, and the occasional eruption. Being thrown out of the kitchen because one’s Easter bread kneading technique isn’t up to par. As Adriana “When the Trigianis reach out and touch someone, we do it with food.” Like the recipes that have been handed down for generations from mother to daughter and grandmother to granddaughter, the family’s celebrations are also anchored to the life and laughter around the table. We learn how Grandmom Yolanda Trigiani sometimes wrote her recipes in code, or worked from memory, guarding her recipes carefully. And we meet Grandma Lucia Bonicelli, who never raised her voice and believed that when people fight at the dinner table, the food turns to poison in the body.

Adriana Trigiani’s voice springs to life from the first page of Cooking with My Sisters , a collection of beloved family recipes that the Trigianis have been enjoying for generations. But there’s much more here than just the food. Peppered with hilarious family anecdotes, poignant letters, and exquisite color photographs, Cooking with My Sisters draws us into the warm and witty world of the Trigiani clan. Each recipe has a story behind it, and each chapter has tips from different sisters, reflecting the unique personalities of the latest generation of Trigiani women.

Here are mainstay meals, featured in sections such as “The Big Life” and “The Big Wow,” which include the chapters “Pasta, or as We Called It, Maccheroni ” and “Food We Hated as Kids but Love to Serve Now.” Accessible to any cook, the recipes range from Chicken and Polenta, Zizi Mary’s Rice Soup, and Gnocchi to favorite desserts like Grandmom’s Buttermilk Cake–and all the delectable dishes are geared toward bringing your family together.

Written with Adriana Trigiani’s trademark humor and verve, this wonderful book will appeal to anyone who values the bonds that food, community, and cultural tradition can provide.


From the Hardcover edition.

Genres: Cookbooks, Nonfiction, Cooking, Food, Memoir, Italy, Italian Literature

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Join Adriana Trigiani and the great authors and luminaries of our time on the YOU ARE WHAT YOU READ PODCAST! Available wherever you listen to podcasts: https://linktr.ee/adrianatrigiani

Beloved by millions of readers around the world for her "dazzling" novels (USA Today), Adriana Trigiani is "a master of palpable and visual detail" (Washington Post) and "a comedy writer with a heart of gold" (New York Times). She is the New York Times bestselling author of twenty books of fiction and nonfiction, including her latest, The Good Left Undone- an instant New York Times best seller, Book of the Month pick and People's Book of the Week. Her work is published in 38 languages around the world. An award-winning playwright, television writer/producer and filmmaker, Adriana's screen credits include writer/director of the major motion picture of her debut novel, Big Stone Gap, the adaptation of her novel Very Valentine and director of Then Came You. Adriana grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia where she co-founded The Origin Project, an in-school writing program serving over 2,700 students in Appalachia. She is at work on her next novel for Dutton at Penguin Random House.

Follow Adriana on Facebook and Instagram @AdrianaTrigiani and on TikTok @AdrianaTrigianiAuthor or visit her website: AdrianaTrigiani.com.

Reviews

[Book Concierge · Rating 3 out of 5]

Co-written with Mary Yolanda Trigiani, with contributions by Lucia Anna, Antonio, Francesca and Ida Trigiani


Subtitle: One Hundred Years of Family Recipes from Bari to Big Stone Gap

Trigiani is well-known for her fiction, frequently drawing from her family history to draw her characters and launch her plots.

This book is a combination of memoir and cookbook, in which she relates many family stories from how her grandparents met, to Easters spent on her grandfather’s farm, to raucous family gatherings, to her parents’ words of wisdom, and that special time of year when she and her siblings and cousins would be sent out into the fields to pick the dandelion greens for a special dish. (Note: My own “adopted” Sicilian grandmother made delicious “dandelion patties” each spring, making sure the greens were harvested before her sons came to treat the yard with weed killer. I really miss that dish!)

I like how there are asides by her sisters sprinkled throughout, adding bits of advice or alternate ingredients for a particular dish.

This is a delicious treat. It's a fun read and has some great recipes, some of which are simple for even a beginning cook, and others of which are quite complicated and best done with an assembly line of helpers. One thing is clear, though, the main ingredient in any good family kitchen is love.

[Onceinabluemoon · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOVED this, coming from a cold English family I always admire the love and warmth of a large Italian family. This book is a charmer filled with family photos and recipes. After recently reading the stone gap series I was hooked on the author and loved visiting with her family in the kichen, I am departing happy with a fist full of recipes.

[Suzanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

First, if you can attend a book talk by an author you enjoy, I highly recommend it. Seeing Adriana Trigiani in person before I read this book allowed me to read in her "voice." It made the book especially entertaining because she seems to be quite a character herself! While I cannot comment on the taste of any of the recipes shared, it is interesting to compare some traditional Italian foods the Trigiani family way with my family’s ingredients and preparation. I may never use any recipe from this book, (I am blessed with my husband, Mark being a fantastic cook!) but why I loved reading it is all the wonderful memories of my family that it brings back. Italians LOVE good food! Every big event involves preparing and eating something your family and friends will enjoy as much as they do each other's company. But more than that, food is prepared lovingly, with great care to make every day special and to remind those that eat it how much they are loved! Mark always says, my mom loved to cook because a delicious meal was her way of showing us how much she loved us. Reading this book shows that Adriana and her family cook just like my mom, grandmothers, aunts, husband and brother--with lots of love! Mangia!

[Kathy (Bermudaonion) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is so much more than a cookbook. It’s a memoir of a big, loving family and the food they shared. The stories are charming and the recipes are wonderful.

[Colleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really loved this book. It's really a story about food and family with some great Italian recipes thrown in. The sauce recipe is authentic. It's just how my mother-in-law makes it and she learned the recipe from her father-in-law who was from Italy and a great cook! Very fun and entertaining book, especially if you love to cook.

[Suzanne Tiller · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delightful

Family stories were charming. Recipies looked delicious,most very labor intensive. Love the italian American family stories. I found this a quick read,enjoyed the pictures

[Janelle Brookman · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was ok. I enjoyed the family story better than the recipes.

[Amy Beck · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading about the warmth shared by this family as they came together to experience the joy of cooking while creating their own family traditions.

I'm a fan of this authoress and have read most of her books, so it was interesting to discover links to how her family's lives and livelihoods affect the same in creating those of her novels' characters.

Because my own, very-politically-active mother always told me she was truly trying to make this a better world for her children, this sentence from the book resonated deeply with me:
"They’re extraordinarily powerful little words, leave the world better than you found it, and they can strengthen the resolve to do the right thing in the face of whatever challenges or irritates or even hurts."

[Suzette · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am so excited about this cookbook! First I am a huge Adriana Trigiani fan and have read all of her books. Second, I am Italian American and my family has lost a lot of recipes from my mother and grandmother; they were not every written down. I feel like reading the recipes in this book is the closest I have ever read that reminds me of my grandmother and mother's recipes. Plus, I love the story about her Italian family. It has inspired me to start trying to make some of the homemade food I remember from my childhood.

[Olivia Arquette · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Adriana and I love this cookbook. As an Italian, I can verify the authenticity of many of her recipes. The way Adriana interspersed the recipes with family stories made me feel like I was enjoying a virtual meal with the Trigianis!

As a side note, if you ever have the chance to see Adriana present at an author visit, I strongly encourage you go. She is warm, funny, charming, and engaging, and I had to stop myself from running to the stage to give her a hug!

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

How could I not like this book-I love Adriana's books and I love to cook. This felt like getting together with my big loud Italian family, to cook our favorite meal. Like the Trigiani sisters, I enjoy to cook my Grandma's, Aunt's and Mom's recipes, so this was a delight. I cannot believe I have not read this book before.

[Kimberly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read cookbooks like most people read novels, and I read them all the way through before I make any recipes out of them. This cookbook is like no other that I have seen. The family stories included in the book make it all the more interesting. I will write more when I have tried a few things in here. But, so far I'm glad I made the purchase. It's an interesting book to read.

[Sue Wyand · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love looking at cookbooks. This one was even more of a book as the authors had included family pictures and stories. And the fact that the title was Cooking with my Sisters...brought lots of memories of how much my sisters and I enjoy cooking together and for others.

[Judy Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great stories along with family recipes. I enjoyed both aspects of this book.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Love to read how family history is woven into well-loved recipes.

[Trish · Rating 2 out of 5]

Best recipe is Viola's Manhattan Cocktail !

[Linda Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderful family remembrances, humor, family cooperation, stories and humor. Some good recipes too.

[Joan Caruana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun cooking

Fun and useful cookbook- with great stories. The family history and varied tastes and pleasures make for a good read and great recipes!

[Gretchen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yes it is possible to read and enjoy reading a cookbook. This collection of recipes combined with the story of an Italian family in Big Stone Gap, Virginia is a fun read.

[Ray and Kathy Marsh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Food, family and tradition

I enjoyed reading g this book/cookbook. I liked reading about the author and her family. It was entertaining. I will try several of the recipes.

[Morgan Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great cookbook full of incredible Italian-Apalacian recipes. I can't wait to try out more recipes!

[Donna · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a lovely memoir of growing up in an Italian household. It was fun to read and is filled with easy recipes. Very enjoyable!

[Joseph Caprile · Rating 3 out of 5]

A cook book that organizes the recipes around an Italian family that grew up in Virginia.
A pleasant story and many great recipes to try.
Author also wrote “The shoemakers wife” which was great.

[Carol · Rating 3 out of 5]

Since I have enjoyed all of this authors books, it was interesting to learn to know Adriana and her family. I enjoyed the recipes and comments by her sisters and also the great respect they had for Grandmom and Grandpop and all their family.
I enjoy Adriana's books because they seem "real" with family and small towns.

[Patricia R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have a signed autographed copy. :)

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is like sitting around a table filled with a big Italian family listening to them reminisce, butt into each others stories with their own take on something, and drool over all the great Italian food. It is interspersed with family recipes that are often so intense that you know why you love to eat Italian food, but not make it.
If you are a fan of Adriana Trigiani's fiction then this is a must read even if you simply skim over the recipes. Often the people, experiences, places etc of her characters are inspired by her life and family. It makes you feel like you know the characters better by getting to know the author.

[Michele · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't read each and every recipe, but I did read each word of the story between each recipe. Since I have a bit of Italian blood, I felt a connection to the sisters. even though our family didn't carry on many Italian traditions as the Trigianis did.
I found the humor in the storytelling hilarious at times, and appreciated the respect and love the family members have for each other. I also loved the family pictures. Such a great addition to a fun cookbook.

[diana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Since it's a cookbook, it's a book I continuely refer to. It's a neat twist on a normal cookbook b/c it tells family stories in between the recipes. I initially heard about this cookbook on an NPR author interview. I was intrigued b/c the author grew up close to where my parents grew up. The recipes have been fantastic so far - though I tend to modify them to make them a bit sweeter.

[Debbie Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the little surprises that readers of Trigiana soon learn—she includes recipes for the dishes mentioned in her stories! It's such a personal thing to do and connects her readers intimately with the characters in her books. Her cookbook is filled with stories and dishes from her family that are every bit as engaging as her fictional stories.

[Kimberly · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book makes me wish I knew these people and could sit down to their table and listen to their stories. Liked the personal quotes throughout. The food would be great if someone made it for me, but the recipes just didn't inspire me to try any for myself - they did seem to be a nice range of easy to more labor intensive.