The myth of traditional Italian cuisine has seduced the world. The truth is very different | Alberto Grandi

"Italy's cuisine has now joined Unesco's intangible heritage list, an announcement greeted within the country with the sort of collective euphoria usually reserved for surprise World Cup runs or the resignation of an unpopular prime minister. Not because the world needed permission to enjoy pizza it clearly didn't but because the news soothed a longstanding national irritation: France and Japan, recognised in 2010 and 2013, had beaten us to it."

"Yet the strength of Italian cuisine has never rested on an ancient, coherent culinary canon. Most of what passes for ancient regional tradition was assembled in the late 20th century, largely for tourism and domestic reassurance. The real history of Italian food is turbulent: a saga of hunger, improvisation, migration, industrialisation and sheer survival instinct. It is not a serene lineage of grandmothers, sunlit tables and recipes carved in marble."

"To make matters worse (or better, depending on your sense of humour), the Italian cuisine that conquered the world was not the one Italians carried with them when they emigrated. They had no such cuisine to carry. Those who left Italy did so because they were hungry. If they'd had daily access to tortellini, lasagne and bowls of spaghetti as later imagined, they would not have boarded ships for New York, Buenos Aires or Sao Paulo to face discrimination, exploitation and the occasional lynching."

Italy's cuisine joined Unesco's intangible heritage list, producing national euphoria and easing resentment over France and Japan's earlier recognition. Much of what is presented as ancient regional tradition was assembled in the late 20th century for tourism and domestic reassurance. The historical reality of Italian food is turbulent, marked by hunger, improvisation, migration, industrialisation and survival instinct. Culinary identity developed from scarcity and adaptation rather than an uninterrupted lineage of traditional recipes. Emigrants left poor villages without a rich pantry, encountered abundance abroad, and adapted ingredients to create the international image of Italian cuisine.

Read at www.theguardian.com