The book by Mauro Ruggiero (200 pages, Triton publishing house) has clearly the aim of illustrating the Mediterranean diet through a detailed overview including history, medicine and gastronomy
A lucky coincidence has seen a winning marriage taking place on 16th November: on that very day UNESCO conferred a price to the Mediterranean diet as an intangible asset to save and protect and, at the same time, the publication in the Czech language of a book dedicated to this nutritional model was being announced in Prague.
The work entitled “Mare Nostrum. Historie, receptury a tajemství støedomoøské stravy” (Mare Nostrum. History, Recipes and Secrets in the Mediterranean food) has been edited by the Italian researcher Mauro Ruggiero from the Italian Institute of Culture in Prague and published also in collaboration with the Local Tourism Office of Salerno.
“ The project wants to meet the growing interest from the citizens of this country in the Mediterranean diet and in the Italian food culture in particular. The Czech are more and more careful about what they eat, and this is proved by the growing interest in the “bio” products” – has explained Ruggiero who does not conceal his southern origins (he’s from Salerno) which is also one of the reason of his passion for organic food. “I stem from a family of restaurateurs and my parents are the first people I dedicate this work to”.
And here is a publication that really can help boost the food culture of Czech Republic, which has been somewhat missing in the editorial rich heritage of this country so far.
On the one hand it is true that over the last twenty years the Czech have made great strides in the food field; on the other hand it’s also true that there’s still much to be done. The figures shown by a recent survey clearly prove that Czech consumers are using the olive oil more and more, which is an essential element of the Mediterranean diet (sales of olive oil are growing: 83% of the Czech buy it regularly, in fact). The problem that has emerged, though, is that most of the population do not use it properly. More than half of it think it should be employed for cold dishes and for salads only. In other words, the majority of the olive oil users is convinced that olive oil is not suitable for frying…
The book by Mauro Ruggiero (200 pages, Triton publishing house) has clearly the aim of illustrating the Mediterranean diet through a detailed overview including history, medicine and gastronomy introduced by contributions from food experts.
The success of this nutritional model is then very well depicted thanks to an essay written by Maria Triassi, the director of the Specialising School in Health and Preventive Medicine of the University Federico II of Naples.
There is also a part dedicated to the old recipes of the Mediterranean diet which is focused on the Cilento area, in the Campania region, right where the author of the book was born. Besides, you can also find a section of Mediterranean recipes invented by famous people and then remade and re-examined by well-known Italian, French and Czech chefs. Among them, we cite Andrea Accordi, an Italian chef in Prague, famous for being the first Michelin star in all Eastern Europe.
Last but not least: all the ingredients mentioned in the book are easily purchasable in the shops of the Czech capital and in the principal towns of this country.
So, once you have read it, the only thing you need to do is to start cooking.