In writing about cookbook author Marcella Hazan, the subject of a new documentary film, New York Times food writer Pete Wells contends, “She changed thoroughly and irreversibly  the way  Italian food is cooked, eaten and talked about in the United States” after her first book, The Classic Italian Cookbook came out in 1973, supposedly eschewing the cuisines of Southern Italy that had been carried and altered by immigrants from Campania, Calabria and Sicily to the U.S. in the late 19^th century.
    Hazan, from Emilia Romagna, herself never criticized that Italian-American strain as did others who held her more northern cookery in higher esteem. And while it is true that Hazan’s first and subsequent books were best sellers––she was not a professional chef­­––she had nothing like the influence on Italian food that Julia Child had on French. Yet Hazan, was vigorously promoted by in the 1970s promoted by Times food editor Craig Claiborne, saying,  “No one has ever done more to spread the gospel of pure Italian cookery in America.”
    But Hazan already had strong shoulders to stand on: Long before she came on the scene one of the most popular cookbooks in America was The Talisman Italian American Cookbook––1,054 pages, written by Ada Boni (right) and published in Italy in 1929, to be followed by a British and best-selling American edition in 1950 (including a few Italian-American recipes), which was compared  to canonical The Joy of Cooking and Fannie Farmer for its comprehensive authority. Just as successful was Italian Food by British writer Elizabeth David, (right) which appeared in its U.S, edition in 1958, which went to a series of updates and revisions through three successive decades. As early as 1954 the Culinary Arts Institute of Chicago published The Italian Cookbook: 160 Masterpieces of Italian Cookery that went far beyond the clichés of spaghetti-and-meatballs and chicken parmigiana, with recipes for five pizzas, Milanese risotto, polenta, pasta con piselli, spinaci alla fiorentina, panettone, agnello al forno, baccalà alla marinara and more.  
    Journalist Waverly Root’s two   scholarly books, The Cooking of Italy (1968) and The Food of Italy (1971) had great impact on the way people thought of regional Italian food. Tuscan food authority Giuliano Bugialli published The Fine Art of Italian Cooking based on enormous historical research, and it, too, became a best seller and had tremendous influence on Italian cooking in the U.S. Hazan, then, was not the first or the most authoritative  voice on the subject. She was, however, the most promoted, as much for her brusque, chain-smoking demeanor as for her expertise in the kitchen.
   By the pub date of Hazan’s cookbook, Italian food was already mutating in the U.S., led by New York chef-restaurateur Romeo Salta, whose own cookbook, The Pleasures of Italian Cooking appeared in 1962, was largely devoted to northern Italian food of a kind also being served back then at chic midtown places like San Marino, Giambelli and Orsini’s, which were among the most important and fashionable restaurants of their day. A 1949 guidebook named Knife and Fork in New York devoted 13 pages to the city’s Italian restaurants that showed regional variety was available back then, including the exquisite Piemontese cuisine served at Barbetta (still going strong) upon opening in 1906 (right). Enrico & Paglieri (1908) offered spinach pastas, stracciatella, risotto alla piemontese with squash and truffles; Adano (named after John Hershey’s novel) had osso buco and rollatine di vitello; Amalfi’s menu listed zuppa di pesce, linguine with artichoke sauce and  pollo alla Toscana; and Sorrento featured the cooking of that southern Italian region.
    I do not wish to deny Hazan’s importance as a spreader of the true Italian gospel, but those who again and again scorned Italian-American as little more than overcooked red sauce with an overdose of garlic might have been surprised not only by the variety of Italian-American food and the canny way it was an adaption of southern Italian food, but that scores of the recipes in Hazan’s own cookbooks could easily be found on the menus of post-war Italian-American restaurants, including her versions of fried zucchini and calamari, braised beef in red wine, garlic bread, chickpea minestrone, chicken alla scarpariello, veal cutlet alla milanese,  scaloppine of veal with Marsala, potato croquettes, shrimp scampi, tortellini in brodo, spaghetti with clam sauce, cannelloni, pasta aglio e olio, penne al pesto, meatballs, escarole soup, stracciatella soup, eggplant alla parmigiana, pastry fritters and zabaione.
    For our Italian-American Cookbook (2000), my wife Galina and I  compiled 250 recipes that we believed should be part of the culinary culture brought by immigrants who enriched it. Our recipes did not stop with dishes made before World War II, for it was in the post-war period and on into the 1960s and 1970s  that Italian food both in Italy and the U.S. was utterly changed by the availability of true Italian products, cheeses, pastas, extra virgin olive oil, Prosciutto di Parma, white truffles and, not least, hundreds of superb Italian wines.
    By the time Hazan’s book came out in 1973 she was able to capitalize on this new bounty and to add dimension to Italian food, yet even though she spoke about the regionality of dishes in Italy, it took successive cookbooks for her to include them, while still keeping those dishes Italian-Americans had been enjoying for decades.
    And lest we forget,  Italians had never laid eyes on tomatoes, potatoes, chile peppers, corn, turkey, strawberries and much more until imported from the Americas after Columbus reached the New World, so that it would have been impossible for Italian food culture to develop as it did until such foods arrived, starting in the 16^th century. So that when Italian immigrants came to American shores they were already very familiar with what they found in the markets here that they could turn into their own Italian-America cuisine.
    Marcella Hazan was an important figure in her day, her recipes always worked and many Americans learned  much from her. But she did not and could not do it alone without the influx of Italian products entering the U.S, around the time she wrote her first cookbook. True credit should always be spread around.

    David’s late wife had been a flight attendant, who, while helping people from a burning plane that had crash landed at LaGuardia, died from smoke inhalation just before the flames were put out. David was devastated by his loss and took a leave of absence from the police force, and it was one of the factors that had contributed to David’s retiring at the top of his career. That, and the conflicts with Giuliani, took away the zeal he had once had for the job of solving mob crimes and arresting the mobsters, knowing that this time they would not be getting off with the help of a low-life lawyer or corrupt judge.
         And it was why he moved out of the Bronx after never knowing a home anywhere else, going up the Hudson River, buying a small house that needed work and a garden that needed planting. Nevertheless, David couldn’t help feeling out of the old game of cops and robbers, and he followed the news about mob activity and how his former colleagues either caught the bastards or completely screwed up. He often had to fight the urge to call up his old friends on the force and rant a bit, or at least make some suggestions.
         Which is why his alliance with Katie Cavuto had been so rewarding. In case after case, they had worked diligently to untie the knots and part the clouds of a mystery, almost getting killed in the prospect. Now, to be in Paris with Katie leading him around, eating good food and drinking good wine, David couldn’t be more content. His affection for Katie was no longer just an older man’s infatuation with a wonderful younger woman. They had shared dire moments together, and in solving the mysteries they were involved with was as satisfying as when he was back on the force.
         David had to admit that this current mystery about the hotels had not gripped him in the way it seemed to attract Katie, although he knew that investigative reporting was her job and her passion. But he really couldn’t get overly excited about a bunch of rich hotel guests coming down with a virus that didn’t seem to kill any of them.  He felt very sure a crime had been committed, but it wasn’t the kind of crime he had much interest in. Still, there he was in Paris with Katie, helping her out each step of the way, and that was more than enough to keep him happy.
         Katie, for her part, was indeed avid to pursue the story—it was always “the story,” not so much “the case”—and she could never imagine retiring from what had been an exceptionally fascinating career, one she had made the most of. Most of her stories required grunt work, hours in archives, interviews with unresponsive politicians and business executives, and she’d come up with first-rate exposés that made Alan Dobell proud and sold copies of the magazine. She was the one who had to convince her editor that those stories that required her to go out of the country, with all attendant expenses, would be worth it.  This time the Paris story was Dobell’s idea, at least the notion that there might be a story in it all. Pages were tight and ads slim in the magazine, so his priorities were to publish stories that the whole range of media were not pursuing. His mantra given to his reporters was always, “Make ‘em squirm.”
         Katie, of course, loved having David by her side in these investigations, at first because of all his connections with so many law enforcement agencies, from the FBI to the Paris Sûreté. His instincts were based on more than twenty-five years of investigation, assessing of evidence, working with experts in many fields and dealing with the NYPD bureaucracy. Hers were more intuition—she’d avoid the word “woman’s” if asked—and she was more concerned with assessing character and the way people looked and talked so that she could build a vivid narrative in her reporting. So, David’s and her different styles were wholly complementary. And, as she’d told him so many times, he was a really good guy. David, in his mind, hoped she’d say “good man,” but her characterization was more than enough to savor.
         David put in a call to Borel  but did not expect an immediate call back. Still, that afternoon Borel did call, saying he was at the crime scene  in Nanterre and that he hadn’t had time to go over the info the police had received from Dr. Baer.
         “I’m assuming there is no connection to this Nanterre business?” asked David.
         “I very much doubt it,” said Borel. “The perpetrator is a psycho, very, very right wing, or left wing, who knows with these people? I’m a little surprised he didn’t turn the gun on himself. It would have saved us a lot of trouble. Anyway, I’m tied down with this for the next day or two.”
         “There’s no one pursuing the hotel incidents?”
         “Ah, oui, we have some people in the office collecting information.”
         “Are they looking at a Russian connection?”
        "So far no real connection. As you know, the virus might have been stolen for use by some other nationals outside Russia. But at this point, frankly, we have no clues.”      
     That was the kind of admission that stirred David’s police instincts. But without any police connections in Paris besides Borel, he felt he’d be floundering around, not knowing the language, not even knowing where there might be cells of terrorists. It’s so much easier when you have a lone mad gunman like the guy in Nanterre. Then again, that kind of crime didn’t offer much of a challenge, just reams of follow-up paperwork. David thought that the only way to get further into the hotel case—and he now considered this a bonafide case—was through Catherine Newcombe.
         Over breakfast David said as much to Katie, wondering if Alan Dobell was going to allow them much more time in Paris.
         “I doubt it,” said Katie. “I told him about what Baer said, and he seemed mildly intrigued, but this just may not turn out to be a long form story for McClure’s. It was the type of story the New York Times Paris bureau chief might push for as a Sunday magazine piece. I think we probably have till the end of the week before he cuts the cord.”
         “I’m thinking Catherine might be of help, because you and I don’t know anyone else here, and she seems to know everyone.”
         “I agree,” said Katie, “which is why we’re having lunch with her today. She says it’s her favorite restaurant in her neighborhood, and I think she might have once had, or still has, a thing going on with the chef. We’ll see.”
         The two Americans met the third American at a brasserie named La Confiture aux Cochons, which Katie told David meant “marmalade for the pigs,” which was a play on a colloquial saying meaning something that is a waste of time, but at the restaurant suggested the pigs were treated very well. Indeed, roast suckling pig was the chef’s specialty, and a very rare one on Paris menus. Above the door was a cut-out of a cartoon pig’s head licking marmalade from his lips. Inside the spacious brasserie was an open kitchen with a rotisserie oven on which suckling pigs, lamb and chicken were turning and giving off aromas impossible to resist.
         Catherine was there, speaking to the chef, whose name was Jacques Dornay. “I told him to speak English,” said Catherine, “but he’s a little shy about it. I think all the mistakes he makes are charming.”
         “How come the French never think Americans trying to speak French are charming? They seem repelled by the way we pronounce words.”
         “C’est le vie!” said Catherine, who had her arm around Jacques’s shoulder.
         They sat down and Jacques said he had prepared a menu for them, a little of this, a little of that, not too much. Which turned out not to be even close to the truth, for the trio of Americans were there for three hours, treated to course after course of charcuterie, rillettes and pâtés, platters of glistening cut-up pig, lamb and chicken, garlic-rich spinach and potatoes whipped liberally with butter, then a plate of cheeses from Jacques’s hometown in Normandy, and finally light-as-a-feather profiteroles with vanilla ice cream and bittersweet chocolate sauce. They began with a glass of sparkling wine, followed by a red Burgundy. The trio all begged off the Calvados brandy at the end.