-Buongiorno.

I'm Lidia Bastianich, and teaching you about Italian food has always been my passion.

Just like that.

You got that right.

It has always been about cooking together and building your confidence in the kitchen.

For me, food is about gathering around the table to enjoy loved ones.

Your family is going to love it.

Share a delicious meal and make memories.

Tutti a tavola a mangiare.

"Lidia's Kitchen: Meals & Memories."

-Funding provided by... -Every can of Cento tomatoes is born in Italy, where they are grown and ripened in sun-drenched fields and then harvested by local farmers who select them just for us.

Cento -- trust your family with our family.

-Grana Padano -- authentic, Italian, rich in tradition, yet contemporary.

-It's the Italian way.

Prosecco DOC rosé.

A toast of Italy.

-Locatelli Pecorino Romano cheese from Italy -- handcrafted from 100% sheep's milk.

♪♪ -Olitalia -- from chef to chef.

-I always say let the ingredients shine, because when you buy quality ingredients, let them speak for themselves.

This salad makes a great lunch or light dinner.

You see how simple this is?

But there's a lot to it.

Its clean and simple preparation will leave you feeling nourished.

The classic puttanesca flavors make a quick, bold, spicy sauce that pairs well with more than just spaghetti.

Here, I try it with tuna, eggplant, and zucchini.

One pot, you got the whole meal -- vegetables and proteins and the intensity of the Italian flavor.

Listen, do you hear that?

The kitchen is calling.

Things have really changed on the American scene since I came in 1958.

I was young, but, you know, I was intrigued by, like, peanut butter and jelly and packaged cereal.

In Italy, you grew from the farm to the table and so on.

Soon I came to realize that's what I was missing.

And slowly I saw this evolution.

America became aware food really should be seasonal, should be local.

We should be connected to the farmers.

And all of these things matter in eating and really respecting our world and respecting food.

Insalata di broccoli, cannellini, e uova sode.

Salad -- We're going to make a great salad today.

So, you clean the broccoli first.

I like to use everything of the broccoli.

So I'm going to use the stem.

And this you just kind of pull like that.

And then I'm going to cut this in kind of matchsticks.

Gonna cut this, too, so they're all the same size, more or less.

I always tell you, when you cook things in the same recipe, try to make the same size so it cooks quicker.

So let me throw that in.

That will take a few more minutes.

And let's finish cleaning the broccoli.

The broccoli, I like the florets nice and small like this.

So we can just break it open.

So you can just break them.

You can cut them off.

Let's put the rest of the broccoli right in there.

Cover it.

You want a quick boil just to blanch them.

The beans, you could cook them, but if you cook the beans, then you need to soak them the night before, and then you cook them until they're nice and soft.

Or these are actually canned beans.

Here is the onion that I'm going to add, red onion.

And I like red onion.

If you don't have red onion, white onion is fine.

I do like half moon and thin.

I'm looking at this.

Is this enough?

Maybe a little more.

Okay, that is enough.

Let me take some ice water.

And I'm going to put the broccoli right in here, so they're going to stop the cooking process.

Let's see how they are.

Mm, they're at a nice point.

Now, could you do this with other vegetables?

Absolutely.

This could be string beans.

This could be carrots.

Well, carrots I don't know if I like, but green vegetables like this.

You can substitute with the one you like.

So I'm going to let this chill.

We're going to strain them out and we'll be ready to dress the salad.

Buongiorno.

Benvenuti to my library.

Here is where I read your e-mails and answer you.

And here, Sarina and Terry write, "After watching your show, we made your Tuna & Chickpea Salad with Boiled Eggs (& Crusty Bread on the side).

You motivate us to cook all the time."

Oh, look how good that looks.

Good for you.

And I like that you put the eggs on the side so people can mix it in when they want it and how, because the egg will break down.

So I love the way you have it set, ready to go, the crusty bread on the side just to add to your creativity.

You know what I love in this salad, as well, and it's not in the recipe?

Scallions.

Chopped scallions, the green part, too, really makes delicious addition.

Thank you.

Thank you for writing in.

So, the broccoli has cooled, and we are ready to mix the salad.

Let's put the broccoli all right in.

Some olives cured in oil.

They always bring a lot of flavor.

Now, they're pitted.

Now, here are some eggs.

And let's cut the eggs.

In four like that.

You see how simple this is?

But there's a lot to it in a sense of nourishing, in a sense of flavor.

And let's put that in here.

And salt.

Put some pepper.

Olive oil.

And wine vinegar.

Let me just taste a little bit.

A little bit more salt.

Always taste.

I tell you all the time.

Through your years of cooking, you have collected a lot of information, things that you like, and it's all stored in your food library.

And when you're tasting, you're kind of recalling, "Is it what I remember was good?"

So keep on tasting.

We are ready to plate.

♪♪ Okay, I'm trying to balance everything out that each plate has a lot of the broccoli, some eggs, olives.

I want some olives in there.

The kind of fluffier and bigger chunks are at the top, so don't forget to fish at the bottom when you are making your plate.

That looks nice.

Let me get some.

And the olive is there, and the broccoli's here.

So we are all ready to mangiare.

And, of course, we're going to drink something with it.

So what I'm making here is the shrub, they call it now.

I used to drink this when I was a little girl.

Grandma used to make it for me.

And what she would do is just water.

I didn't have ice.

Cold running water, nice and cool.

Wine vinegar, which Grandpa made.

Simple syrup.

Grandma would put in regular sugar.

But here, because I have the ice, I put the simple syrup.

Makes this drink delicious, but you can use it for other drinks, as well.

And in this case, some sparkling water.

Let me tell you, Grandma would just take it from the faucet and she would put it in bottles.

We would take it to the beach.

And she would put it in those mesh bags.

And they were reusable all the time.

She would put the bottle in there, and when we went to the beach, we would take that net bag with the bottle, put it in the sea.

The handle of the bag, we'd put a big rock, and the bottle would kind of be in the sea and stay nice and cool for us to drink the whole day.

I like to taste.

Let's see.

Okay.

It's good.

It brings back memories.

Mmm!

Let's pour some for me.

I'll pour some for you, too.

How's that?

Oh, I'm sure that you have this experience, that sometimes you are just going into a room, and there's an aroma there, and it takes you back to a place that you had almost forgotten about.

So here I am.

Let's taste this salad.

Olive, broccoli, bean.

I'm taking you to a very special place for me, when I was back in the courtyard with Grandma.

Just as I remember it.

Delicious.

So many memories in this glass of, as you call it, shrub.

-Salute!

-It always brings me such joy to connect through food.

My friends are everywhere from Italy to New York.

We always end up discussing all things delicious.

We're going to Kansas City today.

I'm expecting a call from Chef Cody Hogan.

He's the chef at Lidia's in Kansas City, and we always share ideas.

So here he is.

He's calling.

How you doing?

-Hello!

Fine.

Thank you.

Welcome to my kitchen.

-Oh, looks great.

I love those pots hanging all over.

I have it in my kitchen.

You just turn around and take what you need, right?

-And there's what you need.

-So, you and I, we connect all the time like this, discuss recipes for the restaurant.

And, you know, there we have our three pasta specials.

But one of the pastas that everybody loves and that could be easily made at home is cacio e pepe.

So I want your rendition of cacio e pepe.

Three ingredients, how do you make them work?

-It's very simple, but it's all the details that make the difference when you're cooking it.

You want to have good spaghetti.

You want to have fresh peppercorns.

You don't want to have pre-ground peppercorns, those that sit around in the pantry for months and months, 'cause they lose all their -- they lose their life.

-So the pasta's cooking.

And what have you done before to prepare for the finished product?

-I have grated Pecorino.

-Pecorino is a sheep's milk cheese.

And cacio e pepe is a Roman dish.

And the Romans love their Pecorino.

But it is, you know, full of flavor.

-You know, for some people, they find that cheese a little strong.

You could also use a little grana if you wanted to mix the two together to mellow the flavors a little bit.

And then fresh peppercorn.

If you have a good pepper mill that you can adjust the settings on and make it really, really coarse, I like to do that.

If you have a mortar and pestle, that makes really nice, coarse pepper, as well.

You can do that.

At the restaurant, when we're trying to do a lot of pepper at one time or if I'm here at home and I'm in a hurry, I like to use a skillet to crush my pepper.

So I have the peppercorns.

I just put them directly on the cutting board, and then with the skillet, just a little of your body weight, just give it a good crush.

It really comes to life.

It also is more coarse this way, and when you bite, it has a great texture that comes through.

-This dish requires quite a bit of pepper.

When you're looking at your pasta, it should be like a leopard, spotted with pepper all over, even inside.

-And then I like this with spaghetti, but you can do this with any pasta you have at home, too.

At the restaurant, sometimes we'll do this with tonnarelli, which is a big square spaghetti, or trenette, which is a fresh pasta, which is nice, too.

That's another little variation.

-And in Rome, they use the tonnarelli a lot to make the cacio e pepe.

So a thick spaghetti would be a good substitute if they can't find those.

-Another thing we do in the restaurant is we always prepare this in skillets.

At home, I like to dirty as little as possible.

I like to just toss this in a bowl.

It's easier to wash a bowl than to scrub up a skillet you've been cooking in.

So I like to put some of the hot pasta water in the bowl, get it nice and hot.

When the pasta comes in, it doesn't start losing temperature.

It stays fresh and hot.

I do the same thing with the bowl that I'm going to serve it in.

I warm that up a little bit, too.

Your hand will tell you when it's getting hot, and I just put that back in.

-Great tip.

-My spaghetti is right where I want it.

I like it nice and al dente.

I'm just going to take some out right into the bowl.

You want a little of the pasta water in there.

That's part of the sauce.

Then I've got my peppercorns here and the Pecorino.

Then you want to move that around.

It emulsifies the cheese as it melts with the water.

And then I see I want a little more water in here now.

-The pasta cooking water, it helps to loosen up, when sometimes, you know, as you're tossing your pasta, it gets dry, the cheese is absorbing it, just to make it flow.

So if you drain your pasta, make sure you save some of that water.

-Save some.

-Yeah.

-There we go.

And it's becoming creamy.

-Come on, give me a plateful already.

-Oh, okay.

I'll make you a plate.

-You can taste it for me and tell me.

-Lidia, you got to try this.

-Ah, well, I can't wait.

-But I'll have a bite for you.

-I can't wait to try it.

Cody, I'm tasting it.

[ Both laugh ] -Doesn't get any better than this.

-Well, Cody, thank you for this spectacular lesson.

I hope to come out soon, and then you can make one of these for me.

Okay?

-I'd love to.

-Thanks, Cody.

Ciao.

-Thank you.

-He's just great -- simple, straightforward.

I think we've been working together over 20 years.

He came as a pastry chef.

He now leads the kitchen at Lidia's Kansas City.

Just the best.

Tonno in padella con melanzane e zucchine in salsa puttanesca.

Today I have for you a classic dish that I will surprise you with because I'll make a twist in the recipe.

So here's the oil.

Let's start with the onion.

And the dish that I'm talking about is a puttanesca.

You all know puttanesca sauce.

You make your pasta with the puttanesca.

So let's put some salt here on the onions.

Let's put some peperoncino.

And that's toasting.

And let's get to the vegetables.

So, eggplant.

And you know how I like to just sort of partially peel it.

I got some of the skin left.

Okay.

And I'm going to cut it in cubes.

Nice cubes.

I want to show you the eggplant.

You see, these long, small eggplants are the best to buy.

First of all, they should be firm.

But you see that what makes an eggplant bitter is the seeds and the aging of the seeds.

They mature as they're in the eggplant, and they become brown seeds.

And those are the bitter ones.

So, always a small eggplant.

And your chances of getting less seeds is there.

Let's make some zucchini.

And about the same -- the same size.

And we have -- You say, "Gee, you have quite a bit of vegetables."

Yeah, but, you know, vegetables kind of lose a lot of their water and become smaller in size.

♪♪ So, as you see here, I have all the ingredients of the puttanesca.

Ultimately, I'll add some tuna.

One pot, you got the whole meal -- vegetables and proteins and the intensity of the Italian flavor.

So now let me just salt a little bit the vegetables and peperoncino we put in.

Let me get a little bit of anchovies now in here.

Now this is -- Let's see how much.

One, two, three.

You can use anchovies as you like.

If you like a lot of anchovies, then you use it.

You can omit anchovies if you don't like them and still make this dish.

I'm going to make a little spot here, and I'm going to put the anchovies there, because I want them slowly to kind of break up a little bit.

Okay.

Gaeta olives.

Usually that's good in puttanesca, but you can put green olives, whatever you like.

Capers, of course.

Puttanesca with capers.

And this is chopped thyme.

Let me just chop it a little more.

♪♪ San Marzano tomatoes.

And these tomatoes are fantastic.

They're fantastic because they're sweet, because they have a thin skin, a lot of pulp, and not too much juice and not too much seeds.

So when you're making sauce, you have a lot of juice, a lot of acidity.

The seeds, they have tannins, and that gives you the bitterness.

So the less of all of that that you have, the sweeter your sauce.

So San Marzano is the way to go.

I think I'm all ready.

I'm going to let this cook for about 15 minutes, and I'm going to add the fish to it.

And I have lunch, dinner, whatever you want, ready.

How great is that?

Here's another e-mail from Carol.

It's got a video.

Let's take a look.

-My grandma used to create fresh ravioli stuffed with spinach and ricotta.

It was delicious.

I'd like to try my hand.

How do you do so and be seated for the meal?

Tutti a tavola a mangiare.

-Oh, brava.

Carol.

Well said.

Raviolis are simple, and they can be made in advance.

Follow your grandma's recipe.

Then you spread them out on a sheet pan and put them in the freezer to freeze.

Once they're frozen solid, then you can gather them and put them in little plastic bags and save them that way in the freezer so that when you need them, you pull the whole bag out.

You have your boiling water, plenty of boiling water, because when you introduce something frozen and cold into the water, the temperature goes down.

Throw the raviolis in and proceed like Grandma.

So have fun with those ravioli, Carol, and keep the family tradition going.

Puttanesca.

Here we go.

Yes.

Tuna.

Nice tuna.

You know, tuna doesn't require a lot of cooking.

Whenever you do fish or meat, there's a natural sequence that happens with the knife.

And you just follow that.

And that's your best way of cutting meat or cutting tuna or cutting fish.

I have the vegetables are big pieces, so let me do this, as well, in fairly large pieces.

♪♪ Okay.

And this is a beautiful fillet of tuna.

But I'm going to cut it in -- in pieces, chunks.

One.

♪♪ And here again.

♪♪ I'm going to season this before I put it in with some salt.

With some olive oil just -- And the olive oil is going to coat the tuna and sort of protect it a little bit from the acidity.

Okay.

Just like that.

Let me add the tuna in.

And this is going to go fast.

You know tuna takes very little time to cook.

So although, you know, in Sicily, they cook their tuna.

They don't leave it always raw, if you will.

If they eat it raw, it's one thing, but if they cook it, they cook their tuna.

So let's see.

Let me cover it all with sauce, the tuna.

Let's put a little bit of olive oil just here.

I can see that I need it.

I'm going to raise the temperature because I want a quick cook.

While we wait for the tuna to cook, let me chop some parsley.

Okay.

Put that on the side so I have it ready.

And let's check this tuna.

I think it's done.

Close the fire.

Lidia's little plate.

Get the plates for you guys.

And I'm going to start taking the...

Okay.

Can you see how good, how delicious, how wonderful it looks?

Mm-hmm.

♪♪ ♪♪ Okay, this is enough for Lidia for today.

Okay, that's mine.

So... And you can plate it, or you can bring the whole casserole on the table and put a little bit of parsley.

So let's taste it.

You see, it's a little pink.

And this is perfect.

This is the way I like it.

Really good.

All the complexity of a puttanesca, in this case, the mellowness of the vegetables, and, of course, the tomato really kind of binds it all together.

Are you hungry yet?

Do you want to come over?

So I'm inviting you.

Tutti a tavola a mangiare.

Come and enjoy.

Salute.

♪♪ Think the Italian way.

Keep it simple, great ingredients, and as few ingredients as necessary.

Not only is it delicious, but it is seasonal and healthy.

The simplicity of preparation.

You have one good ingredient.

Don't mask it, don't cover it.

Exalt it.

Simple preparation.

Broccoli, good olive oil, a boiled egg with it, you got yourself a balanced, delicious meal.

-[ Singing in Italian ] -The food from this series is a celebration of the Italian dishes Lidia cooks for the ones she loves the most, from the traditional recipes of her childhood to the new creations she feeds her family today.

All of these easy-to-prepare recipes can be found in Lidia's latest cookbook, "From Our Family Table to Yours," available for $35.

To purchase this cookbook and any of her additional products, call 1-800-PLAY-PBS, or visit shop.pbs.org/lidia.

To learn more about Lidia, access to videos, and to get recipes, tips, techniques, and much more, visit us online at lidiasitaly.com.

Follow Lidia on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, @LidiaBastianich.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -Funding provided by... -At Cento Fine Foods, we're dedicated to preserving the culinary heritage of authentic Italian foods by offering over 100 specialty Italian products for the American kitchen.

Cento -- trust your family with our family.

-Grana Padano -- authentic, Italian, rich in tradition, yet contemporary.

-And by... ♪♪ ♪♪