THE MODERN APICIUS by Francesco Leonardi – 1790
Academia Barilla - Gastronomic Library
Did you know that the work by Leonardi, chef in the most prestigious court kitchens of the eighteenth century, anticipated the program of Italian culinary unification, which would be implemented a century later by Pellegrino Artusi?
This work by Leonardi, first published in 1790, is fundamental as it anticipates the program to unify Italian cuisine that would be implemented a century later by Pellegrino Artusi.
Francesco Leonardi (1730–1816) was a chef who lived as a citizen of the world and served as a chef in the most prestigious court kitchens, such as that of Marshal Richelieu in France and, later, Cardinal De Bernis and Louis XV, Empress Catherine II in Russia, or Emperor Francis I of Austria.
Leonardi’s work makes an effort to recover a "national" dimension of Italian cuisine, albeit segmented into various regional realities.
It is precisely the ties between gastronomy and territory that allow for the variety and richness that still characterize the cuisine of our country throughout the world, giving it the same dignity as the “national” European traditions that Leonardi encountered in fifty years of experience across Europe.