Fabio Viviani

One of my favorite contestants on the Food Network's Top Chef is Fabio Viviani. His Italian accent, good looks, charming way and bromance with fellow contestant Richard Blais made him a true fan favorite. Viviani owns several restaurants and his latest cookbook Fabio's American Home Kitchen had me drooling as I was perusing all of the recipes.

As I read the introduction, I could hear Fabio's heavily accented voice in my head. He begins with a page of Kitchen Notes of "assumptions and some common sense", including "Mayonnaise is also always preferably homemade, though nothing will happen to you if you use store-bought." Whew, good to know!

Each chapter starts with a page, like the Appetizers section, which he calls the "first kiss of your meal". I love that description of appetizers. Again, these one page introductions include Fabio's trademark sense of humor.

The recipes are generally one page each, and are geared towards people who have some familiarity in the kitchen. Reading it, I felt like I was in a good friend's kitchen and he was explaining what he was doing as he was cooking. The instructions felt conversational, which I liked.

The Soups and Sandwiches chapter was my favorite, and I've bookmarked many pages there. I'm not a big tomato soup fan, but his Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese, made with Dijon mustard, is one I will be making for lunch for my husband and me on a rainy, cold Sunday.

I also want to try:

Chilled Corn Soup with Parmesan-Basil Corn Salad
Fresh Tuna Salad Sandwiches (he says it's time we Americans learn how not to use canned tuna)
Rare Beef Pasta Salad
Pasta Salad with Walnuts, Gorgonzola and Mozzarella
Penne with Creamy Mushroom Medley

Naturally, his Pasta chapter has lots of wonderful recipes, all made with fresh ingredients like his Italian grandma taught him. He has a Quick Chicken Parmigiana recipe where he tells us that we should never serve pasta on the side- no chicken with pasta! I've never heard that before.

He also recommends buying Parmesan cheese with the rind on it and grating the rind because it has very little moisture inside and works well in the oven.

At the end of the book, Fabio has Menus for Special Occasions, like a Winter Holiday Meal, and Elegant Dinner Party and Sunday Family Supper using recipes from the book.

I can't wait to cook from Fabio's American Home Kitchen, I will post the results in a future Weekend Cooking post.

Fabio Viviani's website, with lots of recipes, is here.… (más)

I’ve watched a few seasons of Bravo’s Top Chef, but I have never loved a chef as much as Fabio Viviani. The man is just full of great comments, and makes beautiful looking gnocchi.

This cookbook is definitely one of the most entertaining ones I have ever read. The fact that this was self-published is very evident–Fabio clearly just wanted to be himself, and not deal with an editor. Although the broken English and grammar mistakes may be a negative for some, I read the whole book hearing Fabio’s voice in my head, and found the asides and jokes more than made up for the grammar.

I have made a few dishes from this cookbook, and we have been wowed every time. These meals taste completely different from anything we have cooked before (much more like restaurant food!), and were surprisingly simple. There were a few times when Fabio’s so-so English made it a little difficult to follow the recipe, but we were really pleased with the final results. There are several other recipes in this cookbook that we plan to make eventually. This book contains a number of traditional Italian recipes, though most of them are not the kind that you find at your typical Italian restaurant. I would say that the low price of this cookbook makes it a worthwhile investment.

This was the first cookbook I have purchased for my Kindle. I am not the neatest chef in the world, so I was definitely concerned about how this would work. Unfortunately, I was not a fan. If a recipe is on two separate pages, I kept having to click back and forth, which makes me worry about getting my Kindle dirty. My kindle also turns off after a few minutes of inactivity, which was annoying while cooking for 30+ minutes. I guess I could turn this feature off, but that would be annoying to have to do every time I cook from a Kindle cookbook. I love this cookbook, but I wish it would be realized in a physical book format.… (más)