During the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the USA saw the arrival of thousands of immigrants from Italy. Many of these immigrants originated in the south of Italy and Sicily; between 1880 and 1924, 80% of Italian immigrants to the USA were from the south. These immigrants reached America through Ellis Island and settled in some of America’s largest cities, for example Chicago, Philadelphia and most famously New York. The Lower Manhattan neighbourhood situated between Tribeca and the Bowery is known as Little Italy on account of the Italian immigrants who settled there. In 1910, this neighbourhood housed over 10,000 people of Italian origin.
When Italian immigrants came to America, they brought their food with them, though some traditional recipes were adapted based on availability of ingredients and also to appease the American palate. These recipes are mostly based on southern-Italian dishes, specifically meat-based dishes, typically eaten at religious festivals. In Italy at the time, meat and seafood were expensive; however, American wages and commercially made pasta and meat made these dishes easily affordable. They therefore became staples of Italian-American cuisine. Furthermore, traditional Italian food is often based on seasonal vegetables which were adapted out of Italian-American recipes as these vegetables were either unavailable, unaffordable or of a much lesser quality. This led to the creation of Italian-American cuisine, which had been widely embraced by the Second World War. This cuisine includes famous dishes such as spaghetti and meatballs or fettucine alfredo, American favourites that are rarely (if ever) seen in Italy.
Traditionally, Italian food is regional, seasonal and a lifestyle in itself. It is a system that focuses on purity of ingredients, and therefore does not complicate them. Due to local markets, Italian food cannot be a monolith. In Italy we can see the tendency to shop local, leading to ingredients that originate in the region where they are sold, and recipes are made when the ingredients are in season. Whereas in the USA, large supermarkets take prevalence, leading to a more standardised Italian-American cuisine as ingredients are available regardless of the season or region. Therefore, Italian-American cuisine often uses more garlic, more sauce and more cheese to mask the lack of seasonal ingredients. We can also see the emergence of dishes that are more cooked, such as baked ziti or other baked pastas.
Some may oppose traditional Italian and Italian-American cuisine, sparking widescale debate over the ‘authenticity’ of Italian-American food. It has often been concluded that this is a fight between the harmony in Italian traditional food and the abundance presented in Italian-American food. However, I would ask you to rethink this opposition and reframe Italian-American food, not as an unauthentic version of traditional Italian food, but as a representation of history, multiculturalism and a way in which Italian immigrants in the USA combined their traditions from back home with elements of their new life.
- Ava Siena Cohen