Biba’s Italy

Biba’s Italy: Favorite Recipes from the Splendid Cities  By Biba Caggiano, Artisan, 2006. Hardcover. $30; 320 pages

This restrained book, a series of love letters to Italian cities in recipe form, is compact (just over 100 recipes), clear (recipes have simply translated names like Tuscan Farro Soup), and elegant (retro typography, duotone photos).

Recipes run from simple peasant fare to more elaborate preparations, and all feel authentically of the place. Overall this book feels pleasantly contemplative: a volume you’d like to peruse while sipping wine under an olive tree in the Tuscan hills, perhaps, or at least while dreaming of that on your couch.

GIVE THIS TO: Italophiles and bibliophiles. —Tiffany Vickers Davis