When you’re exhausted, there are no plans, you’re home alone - what do you watch? Maybe you zone out to reality TV - lifestyles of the rich and the famous. Perhaps it is the soothing sound of David Attenborough’s voice as he narrates the natural world. Endless reruns of Friends, Seinfeld, The Nanny, Sex and the City? For me it has always been cooking shows. There’s just something about watching saucy pasta turn in a bowl that will always be calming. And if you’re looking to learn how to cook - I always think just watch cooking shows. You’ll pick it up eventually. So, let me now introduce my latest treasure: Pasta Grannies.
I’ve been through all the cooking shows on YouTube. There was the Jamie Oliver 15 minute and 30 minute meals phase. Every single video Bon Appetit has ever released. The New York Times cooking channel on YouTube. Munchie hosting Matty Matheson screaming whilst cooking and the epic two-part series of Action Bronson drinking natural wine and eating his way through Paris. And the instagram worm hole of @recipearce.
But a friend recently DMd me “you’re across this, right?” Cue a new internet rabbit hole. Pasta Grannies travels across Italy finding and filming grandmothers as they share their home recipes for pasta. There seems to be no one under the age of 75. And recipes have often been passed down through generations or simply perfected from a lifetime of making them.
A tour of Italy from Pasta Grannies:
Take Pina making a tomato concentrate on her rooftop. Mixing by hand, using nothing but the sun, salt and time.
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Or here is Pasta Grannie’s most watched video. Cesaria, a (now) 97 year old woman, hand making lorighittas - a twisted pasta reminiscent of hoop earrings - from her hometown of Morgongiori, Sardinia.
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And for simplicity's sake, Pino and Lucia don’t cook their tomato sauce. Instead leaving it to warm through in the midday sun for an hour.
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So here’s to spending a soothing hour (or three) making your way through Pasta Grannies back catalogue of YouTube videos. Or follow @pastagrannies for regular updates of new recipes and sweet grandmas.
