Unplugged Kitchen: A Return to the Simple, Authentic Joys of Cooking

by Viana La Place

In Unplugged Kitchen, sliced peaches become a filling for a country sandwich, Sweet Rum Ricotta becomes an afternoon snack, and the steaming juice of leafy greens becomes "The Verdura Cure." This is no ordinary cookbook. Not only do the recipes have the power to change our perceptions about food but Unplugged Kitchen offers us a map through the landscape of food, with its rituals and its particular pleasures.
In the sensory world of Unplugged Kitchen, your nose pressed to a tomato tells you how freshness smells and your eyes measure olive oil in puddles. You crush walnuts in a beautiful mortar and press soup through a food mill to create more interesting textures.
Viana goes wherever food delights and brings us along to taste asparagus in Rome, radishes and butter in a Parisian cafe, and green almonds under a tree in a Sicilian garden. Along the way she reacquaints us with core ingredients. The verdant scent of lustrous white spring onions, prepared in a Fava and Spring Onion Pasta, is a welcome to spring. Viana reveals the tomato in all its absolute glory, whether it's served pure as nature in a tangy Tomato Cocktail, 1930s style, or as a perfumed dip fragrant with lavish green coriander.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Italian Literature

320 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1996

About the author

Viana La Place is the author or coauthor of eight other Italian cookbooks, including Verdura: Vegtables Italian Style, Cucina Fresca, and Pasta Fresca. She lives in San Francisco.

Reviews

[Tamara Gantt · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a wonderful, different kind of cookbook because it has a lot of personal narrative from the writer. Here's an example from "portrait of my kitchen": "On sunny days the sun streams into my kitchen. Herbs in pots enjoy its warmth on the small terrace just outside the kitchen door. In the late afternoon, long, cool shadows start to fall across the green gardens below. On cloudy days, I look out on gray, brooding skies and wind-whipped trees. I can step out on my terrace and watch the rain fall --- smell the quickening scent of wet black earth, feel the cool moist air against my skin."

This is the kind of writing that occurs throughout the book, and much of it is about the experience of selecting ingredients, going "unplugged," and appreciating food at its most simple and delicious.

[Robin Tobin (On the back porch reading) · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this cookbook!

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

For me, this was more than just a cookbook - it was an introduction to a new way of eating. Viana La Place makes an impassioned case for removing as many of the machines that come between us and our ingredients as possible, and for making every knife cut an expression of our love of life. Clear, concise recipes which never fail to produce clean, vibrant flavors are coupled with passionate food writing and subtle, evocative design.

[Molly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a cookbook you read, rather than simply selecting recipes. It is 100% meat free, but not 'vegetarian' in the strict sense of the word. The recipes are simple, requiring few ingredients, and often very few steps. While the techniques are simple, I would recommend this for confident cooks who require little instruction and have a good grasp on kitchen basics.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very simple recipes using high quality ingredients.
What I like most are her tips sprinkled through out the book on everything from storing leftovers (hint: no plastic wrap involved) to using every part of a vegetable.

[Kelly · Rating 1 out of 5]

New-age bourgeois cooking isn't my style, apparently.

[Ruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this up from the library recently-returned shelf. It is one of the most annoying cookbooks I have read in my life. It is full of specious nonsense.

First of all, the main point of the book is that food processors are inauthentic, so already I'm having trouble taking this person seriously. (Because a food mill is very sensuous, and a sharp chef's knife is gentler on your food than the blades of a food processor. I'm NOT KIDDING, this is what she's asserting.) One of her many pages of unsolicited advice is headed, "can cheese be grated in a food processor? The answer is no." Don't use it to make bread crumbs either! Save your stale bread and grate it by hand. All right, lady.

Another idea that I find ridiculous (that La Place is not at all alone in espousing) is that it's better to cook without measuring, because that's more spontaneous. Also, it is better to squeeze a lemon directly over the food than to use a lemon squeezer, because it's more spontaneous AND authentic. You know what else is authentic? TONS of cilantro! Very authentic! Raw food, authentic, herbs you grow yourself, authentic, rolls from the bakery--also authentic, because it's all about community. Also such rolls are somehow also part of your simple, authentic, natural diet, even if they are croissants, because they are European. Also, if you're going to cook something, don't be wimpy about putting the heat up high, because, wait, "starting with heat at a low, cautious temperature causes your attention to drift and your focus to blur. It takes some of the immediacy out of cooking, and with it, some of the excitement."

Why I still gave this book three stars, and probably could have given it four: it's really funny, and because the recipes are so simple, my guess is that a lot of them will taste good if I make them. The truth is that I am already a pretty decent cook with my own opinions about what tools to use. I can read a recipe and see whether I could make it and like it. No matter how many adjectives La Place uses here, I can imagine what the food will be like. Authentically.

[Ew Lake · Rating 4 out of 5]

Inspiration on every page.

[Carmen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The recipes in this book reminded me a lot of my parent's kitchen table as a kid. Simple, pared down meals, emphasizing fresh and in-season vegetables. I recommend this book to those who grew up eating heavily prepared and processed foods. I also strongly recommend it to vegetarians since I don't think there were any fish or meat-based recipes. There are no photographs and it is more a book on food/eating philosophy, rather than straight-up recipes. I did like the emphasis on an "un-plugged" kitchen, i.e. no microwave, food processor, etc; food tastes better with some elbow grease!

[Celeste Simmons · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was a disappointment. I agree with La Place's message that kitchens should be unplugged and connect us with nature. We should eat flora more than fauna. We should get our food as close to the source as possible. However, I don't like her complaining tone at all. I don't like the sterile, gray layout of the book (and the lack of photos!) I don't like the recipes. Many are simple, Italian dishes, but I think even I could have written them better.

[Cherie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A- This cookbook looks SO yummy! Viana takes things basics by doing things by hand. These recipes drip with Italian countryside good eats--so delicious. I plan on using many of these recipes, and though Viana would be loathe to realize, I'll probably use my food processor for the quick
way out. Yum!

[E G Melby · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked some of the recipes, and the fact that measuring exactly is not in her plans (except for the usual suspects). Is it just me, but do other miss color photos in cookbooks? B&W photography has its place, but I would've appreciated more "oomph" in the spare photos

[Kate W · Rating 4 out of 5]

Simple, personal recipes.