I remember when my daughter Allison was in middle school and our local PBS station started running a cooking show called Lidia's Italy. I used to fold laundry in front of the set on Saturday afternoons, and Lidia Bastianich would walk me through a region of Italy I'd never heard of, then put dinner on the table while she did it. Twenty-some years later, she's still on PBS, still teaching, and still the reason I keep a wedge of Parmigiano-Reggiano in the fridge at all times.
Lidia turned out to be more than a passing favorite. Her current series, Lidia's Kitchen: Reflecting and Reconnecting, is in its eighth season, and a new special called Lidia Celebrates America: A Nation of Neighbors aired around Thanksgiving 2025. She also received the Daytime Emmy Lifetime Achievement Award in June 2024. Her cookbook Lidia's Italy is the one I still reach for first, because the recipes hold up. They aren't trendy, and that's the whole point.
Here is my honest count-down of the ten recipes from Lidia's Italy that have earned a permanent place in my recipe box, with notes from cooking them in a Cedar Rapids kitchen. Every one lives on her website, lidiasitaly.com.
10. Italian-American Lasagna
Lidia is careful to call this the Italian-American lasagna, not the lasagna she grew up with in Istria. It's the layered, ricotta-rich Sunday dish most of us think of when we hear the word, and she walks you through it without any fuss. I make it the day before a family gathering, refrigerate it overnight, and bake it the afternoon of. It slices cleaner that way. Has anyone in your family ever passed down their lasagna ratios on an index card? Mine did, and Lidia's version is the one that finally improved on the family card.
9. Cannelloni
Cannelloni are the cousins lasagna doesn't talk about much. You roll pasta around a meat-and-spinach filling and ladle bechamel on top. My son-in-law Paul is half-Italian on his mother's side and gets a little misty when I make these for Easter. They take an afternoon, but most of it is hands-off.
8. Layered Casserole with Beef, Cabbage and Potato
This one surprised me. It's a humble baked casserole — beef, cabbage, potato, and onion in patient layers — and it tastes like the kind of thing my Hungarian grandmother might have made if she'd married into an Italian family. Lidia ties it to her Istrian roots. It feeds a crowd, holds well, and reheats beautifully on Monday. If you have a deep enameled cast-iron pot, use it.
7. Almond Torta
Now, I will admit I am not a natural baker. My husband Don, the retired pharmacist, has always been more precise with measurements than I am. But Lidia's almond torta — ground almonds, eggs, a little flour, and dark chocolate chips folded in at the end — is forgiving. It comes out dense, moist, and not too sweet, and a slice with coffee on a Sunday morning feels like a small celebration. I've sent two of these home with my granddaughter for her dorm in Iowa City.
6. Pasta with Baked Cherry Tomatoes
Here's a tip I picked up from this recipe and apply to half my summer cooking now: you can roast cherry tomatoes in a hot oven with garlic and olive oil and they will collapse into the most concentrated little sauce you've ever tasted. Toss them with bucatini or spaghetti and a torn basil leaf, and you have a midweek dinner in the time it takes to boil pasta. In August, when our backyard tomatoes finally come in around the second week, I make this almost weekly.
5. Gnocchi with Peas and Gorgonzola
If you've never made gnocchi from scratch, don't be intimidated. The trick, Lidia teaches, is using a baked potato (not boiled) so the dough stays dry, and being gentle with the kneading. Her sauce of peas and gorgonzola sounds fussy but takes six or seven minutes — cream, frozen peas, a knob of butter, and a crumble of blue cheese. The first time I served this, my grandson Sam (who at the time would only eat hot dogs and yogurt) asked for a second helping. That's the highest compliment a recipe can get.
4. Italian-American Meatloaf (Polpettone)
Polpettone is meatloaf with an Italian accent — ground pork and beef, a tucked-in layer of vegetables and cheese, rolled up so it slices beautifully. I make this when my daughter brings the kids up for a long weekend. Serve it with mashed potatoes and a green salad, and nobody has to know it took an hour.
3. Steamed Swordfish, Bagnara-Style
I confess: we are landlocked here, and good swordfish does not always make it to the Hy-Vee fish counter. When I do find a fresh-looking steak, this is what I make. Lidia steams it briefly with capers, olives, and tomato — flavors from the small Calabrian port of Bagnara — and the result is light, summery, and ready in twenty minutes. If swordfish isn't available, halibut works in a pinch, though Lidia would probably gently disagree.
2. Cannoli Napoleon
This is the dessert I bring out when I want to show off a little. Instead of the usual rolled cannoli shells (which I have never successfully made), Lidia layers crispy fried pastry rectangles with a sweetened ricotta and chocolate filling. It looks like something from a bakery window in Sicily and it tastes the way I imagine Palermo smells. A small slice with strong coffee — Lidia's whole philosophy of a meal in one bite. Have you ever tried fried pastry layers at home? They're easier than you'd think.
1. Artichoke Soup
My number one might surprise you. It isn't pasta and it isn't dessert. It's a vegetarian artichoke soup — fresh artichokes (or frozen hearts when they're not in season), potato, leek, and a little Parmigiano rind tossed in for depth. Pureed at the end, it has the silky body of a much richer soup without any cream. I serve it as a starter at Christmas Eve dinner, in small cups, with a swirl of olive oil on top. It is the recipe I think about when somebody asks me what "Italian cooking" really means. Not heavy. Not showy. Just clear, careful, and made with respect for what's in front of you.
A few honest notes for the home cook
- Lidia's website organizes recipes by category — pastas, mains, desserts — and it's worth bookmarking. Some older catalog-style links from years ago no longer work, but the recipes themselves are easy to find through the search bar.
- If you don't already own a cookbook of hers, the original Lidia's Italy from 2007 is still in print. She has a newer one called Lidia's The Art of Pasta that came out recently and is a good companion volume.
- You don't need fancy equipment. A heavy pot, a sharp knife, and a wooden board will get you through almost everything in her repertoire.
- Don't rush. The thing I've learned watching her on PBS for two decades is that she is never in a hurry. The garlic gets golden, not brown. The onions sweat, they don't sear. Slowness is the recipe.
If you're cooking for one or two these days, like Don and I usually are, most of these recipes halve nicely or freeze in single portions. And every one of them is the kind of dinner where you sit down, take a real breath, and remember that food is supposed to bring people closer. Lidia has been quietly making that point on television for twenty-five years now. Isn't that worth tuning in for?
