From the most remote island in Asia to Europe, Africa, America, Oceania: anywhere in the world you can find an Italian restaurant or some sort of Italian food (and yes, it’s not only about pasta and pizza). Food in Italy is culture, tradition, even medicine. And that is why Italians are so jealous of it (take a look here for 10 things Italians would never eat or drink.)

Let’s see why Italian food is so famous.

SIMPLE INGREDIENTS

Italian food is as simple and down to heart as a dish can be. The majority of food contains products you could easily grow in your backyard, such as tomato, basil, e.v. olive oil. Typical dishes like pizza and pasta are made with few ingredients combined. You don’t need to use 100 ingredients to have a delicious, smashing pasta or risotto. Take the most famous Italian risotto, risotto “alla Milanese.” Well, take rice, e.v.o., onion, white wine, broth, butter, saffron, and you’re done. No need to add strange, useless ingredients: as they say, less is more.

HIGH QUALITY

The secret of any Italian dish is the super high quality of the simple ingredients we talked about. If out of a six-ingredient dish, 2 of them are of crap quality, do not expect anything good. So forget canned food.

And that is why real Italian pizza is extremely hard to find outside of Italy: if you change your e.v.o. with simple olive oil, use canned marinara sauce instead of fresh tomato sauce if you put everything you have in the fridge at the top of it… well, that is not pizza.
Remember, few but fresh and super high-quality ingredients, and you’re safe. No frozen food, no processed food, no microwave food.

VARIETY

Italian cuisine is extremely varied, and so are the ingredients commonly used. From north to south there are endless variations and so many different dishes, it’s almost impossible to try everything even in a lifetime. Each of the 20 Italian regions has its own specialties depending both on the geography of the area (mountain, sea, north, south) and the history of it (for instance, Sicily’s Arabic domination means similar desserts to the Arabic Countries).

Generally speaking, in the north of the country, the food is more meat-based, risotto, and polenta are extremely common, and the less known (but equally delicious) pizzoccheri (Lombardy) and gnocchi are widely consumed. Going south, you find the world-famous pesto sauce (Liguria), Lasagna, and Parmigiano Reggiano (Emilia Romagna), pappardelle with meat sauce “ragù” (Tuscany). The region of Rome (Lazio) is famous for its “pasta alla carbonara” and “pasta all’ arrabbiata” and the southern regions with the Sicilian “pasta alla norma” and “arancini”, Napoli’s pizza, and so on. Of course, pizza and pasta are present throughout the whole country.

Cheese is widely consumed (ricotta, mascarpone, parmigiano, pecorino, mozzarella, just to name a few), and so is wine (Italy is the world’s largest producer of wine).