3 days ago
Italian chefs accuse Good Food of bastardising cacio e pepe recipe
It is one of the simplest Italian pasta dishes, combining black pepper and sharp pecorino cheese, but restaurateurs in Rome have accused Britain's leading recipe brand of bastardising cacio e pepe.
In a letter to Good Food and the British embassy in Rome, chefs in the Italian capital complained about the addition of butter and parmesan cheese to a recipe on the Good Food website.
'That's like us coming to Britain and demanding the finest double malt whisky mixed with lemonade,' said Claudio Pica, author of the letter and president of the Rome branch of the restaurant association Fiepet-Confesercenti.
'We demand the recipe, as published, is changed at once,' he said.
Cacio e pepe is thought to have been created by shepherds in the hills above Rome. Needing to travel for days with food in their packs, they conjured the dish out of hard, long-lasting, Roman pecorino sheep's cheese, a handful of peppercorns and pasta.
