The Tucci Table

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Decades later, Tucci is still no stranger to professional kitchens. Dropping in on chefs in Italy, like Tony Lo Coco (I Pupi, Sicily), Sarah Cicolini (Santo Palato, Rome), and Fabio Picchi (Cibrèo, Florence), was one of the joys of making the series. “You have to know how to stay out of the way,” he says with a reverence that recognizes the demanding nature of restaurant work. “That’s what is really important. And be deferential and know what they’re doing. It’s almost like you’re walking on stage while a play is going on.” Tucci was comfortable filming in Italian restaurants. However, he admits, “It doesn’t matter if the chef cooked it 40,000 times... You’re supposed to turn it out perfectly every time, no matter what the circumstances are. And those circumstances change at any given night and at any given moment. And that is the most terrifying and exciting thing about being in a kitchen and being a chef.” Tucci has always loved to cook, and follows his successful 2012 The Tucci Cookbook with a new cookbook, The Tucci Table, filled with recipes from himself, his family and even some famous friends, written with his wife Felicity Blunt, sister of actress Emily Blunt. Featuring family-friendly recipes and stunning photography, an all-new cookbook from New York Times bestselling author, beloved actor, and respected foodie Stanley Tucci. Each recipe comes with a fun little story that introduces the people in Tucci's life, and makes you feel like you know them too. It made the recipes seem more personal, as though this book wasn't mass produced, but given to you as something special. There's a fair bit of humor in this book as well, which made it very easy to flip through for recipes. It's clear that this book was written in love. Growing up, I remember watching movies with the bald guy with the glasses who looked super smart. As I started to select genres that I liked and prefered as one does with age, I was still able to find him in even the strangest of movie selections- of the top of my head, He was reassuring as the doctor in a movie I found utterly boring: The First Avenger, Captain America. He was the reassuring Head designer in that cult classic The Devil Wears Prada. He was frightening in a quiet and menacing way in The lovely Bones and for a while I was hesitant to watch anything else he was in - the mark of a great actor.

Editor's note: This interview with Stanley Tucci appeared in the February issue of the Italian print edition of La Cucina Italiana as well as in the Spring 2021 issue of the American print edition.Featuring family-friendly "simple to make and magnificently delicious" (Mario Batali) recipes and stunning photography, a practical cookbook from New York Times bestselling author, beloved actor, and respected foodie Stanley Tucci. Featuring family-friendly “simple to make and magnificently delicious” (Mario Batali) recipes and stunning photography, a practical cookbook from New York Times bestselling author, beloved actor, and respected foodie Stanley Tucci.

From his late friend actress Natasha Richardson, whom he said was "an extraordinary cook who threw some of the best dinner parties I have ever attended', he shares her Pissaladiere, topped with anchovies, onions and olives.One of the things that’s fascinating about Italy is where it’s situated geographically, he says. “If you think about that alone— the influences over millennia, the topography, and the climate, how diverse it is from Lampedusa to the Alps — it’s just staggering. There aren’t many countries that have that kind of diversity.” Stanley Tucci is an accomplished actor, he is also an accomplished chef; so the writing of a cook book is not so far out of the realm of what should be expected. There was no ice. No cold sugary soda, no kids drinking milk, not even beer was chilled. Eggs and many foods were not refrigerated. These were the surprising impressions Stanley Tucci remembers from that formative year as a 13-year-old boy living in Florence, Italy, during his father’s teaching sabbatical. When he could, Tucci ate pizza and schiacciata, a Tuscan focaccia bread. But mostly, he feasted on his mother’s expanding repertoire of American, Calabrian, and Florentine recipes. In the evening, his parents sent him across the street to buy wine from the grocer. Stanley Tucci's association with wonderful foods began for fans with the movie Big Night and resonated in his role as Julia Child's husband in Julie & Julia. But well before these films, he was enjoying innovative homemade Italian meals throughout his childhood, when family and food were nearly inseparable and cooking was always a familial venture. Stanley Tucci’s association with wonderful foods began for fans with the movie Big Night and resonated in his role as Julia Child’s husband in Julie & Julia. But well before these films, he was enjoying innovative homemade Italian meals throughout his childhood, when family and food were nearly inseparable and cooking was always a familial venture.

But if you think that a cookbook with a celebrity name attached to it is all that The Tucci Table is then you are about to be wonderfully surprised.The guy had a huge cask with a spigot on it. From that, you’d bring your flask of wine, your fiasco, and that’s what my father would have with dinner,” he says. “You could just do it, because it was assumed you were giving it to your parents.”