A journalism school graduate turned newspaper reporter, Alexandria resident Domenica Marchetti could never have dreamed that her second passion in life, cooking, would triumph over the newsroom. “No matter what my job was, when I came home in the evening, I looked at my cookbooks,” she said. She would head to the kitchen to put together family meals. Although food writing was not her regular beat at The Detroit News, she did turn in occasional food stories. When she quit her job to take care of her children, she began to write freelance food articles. “Were I come from, food is love. Italians spend a lot of time at the dinner table, not only enjoying the food but also enjoying the company of family and friends,” she said. “The food isn’t complicated or overwrought. It’s made with fresh, seasonal ingredients and everything is prepared simply so that the ingredients really shine.”
Although she didn’t cook that much when she was really young, she did shadow her mother in the kitchen. “My mom is a great cook,” she said, “and she was always in the kitchen. We would help her out when she was making pasta, help with the ravioli. And when I got older, I looked through her cookbooks and would cook dinner.”
| If you go |
| To welcome the publication of this pasta book, Marchetti in collaboration with chef Nick Stefanelli, is hosting a dinner at Bibiana Osteria-Enoteca, on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. Tickets cost $90 and include a 6-course dinner of appetizer, dessert, wine and a signed copy of the book. For more information, contact Bibiana at 202-216-9550. |
As an added bonus, Marchetti spent many summers with her family in Rome and in a beach house on the Adriatic Coast in Italy. “It’s hard to get a bad meal in Italy,” she says, “except in places that cater to tourists’ tastes. But the good news is that there is still so much wonderful, creative cooking happening in Italian kitchens,”
Describing herself as a “total home cook” and a big proponent of homey, from-scratch cooking, Marchetti has focused on the Italian kitchen, and is now celebrating the release of her third cookbook, “Glorious Pastas of Italy.” Her fourth book, “Williams-Sonoma Rustic Italian,” is being published in the fall.
The recipes in her third book are all hers, but their inspiration comes from a variety of places. “Some are shared recipes from my mom and my aunt,” she said. “Some are classic Italian recipes, and some are gems I discovered when traveling around Italy.”
To highlight some of the more unique pastas, Marchetti dedicated a chapter in the book, titled “Showstoppers,” for such recipes as a football-sized ravioli she came across in her travels in Abruzzo. “We were exploring different parts of the region. So we stopped at a cheese farm for lunch, and one of the items on the menu was Big Ravioli,” she said. “It was huge, filled with sheep’s milk ricotta and a little Parmesan cheese with egg to bind it. It was shaped like a giant half moon.”
With the publication of her third cookbook, Marchetti reports that her mother is thrilled with her daughter’s food world. “My mom loves what I am doing. She loves the fact that I am writing cookbooks and she is my biggest inspiration,” she said. “A lot of her recipes are in my books. So I feel like I am honoring what she taught me by shining a light on her wonderful recipes.”
