By Andrea Lamarche
To celebrate her enduring work on the global importance of Italian cooking traditions, Professor Grazia Menechella presented original research on the remarkable work of Julia Lovejoy Cuniberti for the celebration of the Ninth Annual Week of Italian Cuisine in the World.
According to Prof. Menechella, Cuniberti’s 1917 milestone Practical Italian Recipes for the American Kitchen reshaped traditional American food culture by introducing strong push for cucina casalinga, or home cooking, demonstrating that Italian cuisine has longer presence in American food culture than present-day Mediterranean diet proponents would have us imagine.
Prof. Menechella has dedicated much effort in the last decade to the study of Italian cuisine and its influence on American food culture. She produced this important series of events in the department of French and Italian at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with modest assistance from the Center for European Studies.
Speaking to a packed room of students and members of the public, Prof. Menechella described how Cuniberti’s book was published during a period of increasing Italian immigration to the U.S., just before and after World War I, particularly in the Midwest. Italian food started becoming popular, but many Americans were unfamiliar with some continental ingredients and cooking techniques defining Italian cuisine.
Cuniberti’s cookbook was practical and accessible to an American audience, explained Prof. Menechella. Cuniberti provided Americans with recipes for popular Italian dished but adapted them to suit to American tastes and to feature inexpensive local ingredients. She even mailed the cookbooks by hand to those who requested them. 
Prof. Menechella also discussed the influence of Cuniberti’s work in the decades that followed. As Italian cuisine became extremely popular and dishes like spaghetti with tomato sauce became classic dishes in American homes and U.S.-based Italian restaurants, a new form of cuisine developed – a specifically “Italian-American” cuisine. While this tradition remains underappreciated in Italy today, it’s a staple part of American culture.
Cuniberti’s story is about cultural exchange in a diverse America. For her part, Prof. Menechella has been invited to share her original research at universities and institutes in Milwaukee and Chicago, and she has received commendations for her work from the Italian Cultural Institute and Consul General in Chicago. This fascinating talk captivated the audience with the story of the birth of American-Italian cuisine in the Midwest. We thank UW-Madison French & Italian Chair and Prof. Menechella for her steadfast efforts to research and produce outreach events on this important topic.
Practical Italian Recipes for the American Kitchen was digitized in 2009 and is available to read online free of charge here.