Dumb question... Why is it that all italian food has some sort of red sauce in it? on it? on the side?

Question

I am from an Italian background, a friend asked me this question one day while eating pizza, and it's true that most italian foods do have some sort of tomato sauce on them or with them. someone help.. like i said dumb question but now i am curious

Answer 1

because in italy they grew a lot of tamatoes so it was eay to use a lot of tomatoes in their food you know :)

Answer 2

Not dumb at all.

After the discovery of the New World (the Americas) Italian cooking has been significantly influenced into today's Italian cuisine. Tomato sauce, polenta, and anything piccante would not exist in Italian cuisine without the introduction of tomatoes, corn and peppers - plants native to the Americas.

Tomatoes are a basic ingredient in Mediterranean cuisine and it's quite natural that many Italian dishes make use of tomatoes in a variety of ways. (In parts of Asia, chillies are to the locals what tomatoes are to Italians - many dishes are served with chilies from raw to blended sauces, etc.)

Answer 3

As a third world country, Italy is very poor and its people cannot usually afford to eat fresh meat. Instead they eat tomatoes (Italian word - "Da Tomatio") which they pretend is meat.

The literal translation of "Da Tomatio" is "Cow Meat".

Italian cuisine is heavily influenced by the use of tomatoes, hence the widespread use of red sauce in the Italian food that we see from day to day.

Interestingly, tomato "ketchup" (or "cow chop" ie chopped cow) is widely used in the western world as an accompaniment for real meat.

Answer 4

Americanization ,I ate that stuff my whole life thinking it was authentic. I recently had  a pizza that was  just crust brushed in Olive oil with basil and orregeno and a bit of fresh parmesian and mozzerella. No sauce . Very tasty .and you can distinguish between the flavors of each ingredient

Answer 5

Because tomatoes are a big part of italian culture and they use a lot of them.

Answer 6

because they use tomatoes.....

Answer 7

Just their thing.

Why does all Mexican food have to be wrapped in something?

Why does all British food have to be some sort of organ meat?

*lol*

Answer 8

My guess would be tomatoes are easy and cheap to grow. You could use a cream sauce like Alfredo or olive oil on pasta and pizza too.

Answer 9

Cause Italian love tomatoes like Americans love fast food. And is a ancient tradition. It's been there for ever and ever. Amen.

Sauce actually is called Sunday gravy.

Answer 10

It doesn't Different Regions of Italy use different ingredients. The Italian foods you think of are mainly Italian -American dishes. Am Example is Florentine style foods use Spinach much more than tomatoes

here is a great answer

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What are the characteristics of Italian Cuisine?

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Italian cuisine is extremely varied: the country of Italy was only unified in 1861, and its cuisines reflect the cultural variety of its regions and its diverse history (with culinary influences from Greek, Roman, Norman and Arab civilizations). Italian cuisine is imitated all over the world.

To a certain extent, there is really no such thing as Italian cuisine in the way that one usually understands national cuisines. Each area has its own proud specialties, primarily at regional level, but also even at provincial level. Italian cuisine is not only highly regionalised, it is very seasonal. The high priority placed on the use of fresh, seasonal produce distinguishes the cuisine of Italy from the imitations available in most other countries.

Regional differences

Roman cuisine, for example, uses a lot of pecorino (sheep milk cheese) and offal (frattaglie, frattaje in dialect), while Tuscan cooking features white beans, meat, and unsalted bread. Pizza also varies across the country, the crusts of pizzas in Rome are thin as crackers, while Neapolitan pizza and Sicilian pizza is thicker.

The influence of Northern Italian cuisine can be seen in French and German cuisines. Piemonte and Lombardia each grow their own different kind of rices, which are used to make risotto. The North of Italy is the home of polenta. Emilia-Romagna is known for lasagna and tortellini (stuffed pasta), mortadella, prosciutto, and parmigiano. Naples (Napoli) is the home of pizza, mozzarella cheese and pastries (babà, sfogliatelle). Calabria's cuisine uses a lot of hot pepper for its distinctive salami (that are common, in several varieties, throughout the country) and uses capsicum. Sicily is the home of gelato (ice cream) and granita but its cuisine also has many influences from Arab cuisine (lemon, pistachio) and also includes fish (tuna, swordfish). Sardinia is famous for lamb and pecorino. Every province (sub-division of a Region) has proper desserts and many other recipes.

Northern versus Southern Italian cooking

Traditional Italian cuisine is very regional and does not follow strict North-South patterns. To most, northern and southern Italian cuisines are differentiated primarily by the north using more butter and creams and the south more tomato. In general terms, however, there is a marked difference between regional use of cooking fat and traditional style of pasta. Inland northern and north-eastern regions tend to favour more butter, cream, polenta, mascarpone, grana padano, and parmigiano cheeses, risotto, lasagna and fresh egg pasta. Coastal northern and central regions are somewhat of a bridge between north and south and often use tortellini, ravioli and are known for prosciutto. The southern regions are traditionally known for mozzarella, caciocavallo, and pecorino cheeses, olive oil, and dried pasta. Southern Italian cuisine also makes far greater use of the ubiquitous tomato.

Types of Italian coffee

Italian coffee (it: caffè also known as espresso) is a strong coffee prepared by forcing live steam under pressure, or boiling water, through ground dark-roast coffee beans. It is usually served in a demi-tasse in relatively small quantity. Caffè macchiato is a demi-tasse of espresso topped with a bit of steamed milk or foam. Caffè ristretto is a shortened (less water) version of espresso resulting in a stronger taste. Caffelatte is generally equal parts espresso and steamed milk, similar to cafè au lait, and is typically served in a regular cup. A cappuccino is espresso mixed or topped with steamed, mostly frothy, milk.

Italian wines

Italian cuisine cannot be separated from Italian Wine. Most Italian wines of great renown are produced in three main Italian regions: Piemonte (Barolo), Veneto (Amarone, Pinot Grigio, etc.) and Toscana (Chianti, Brunello). Other great wine producing regions such as Puglie (Primitivo) and Sicily (Planeta) also produce some highly respected wines.

Traditional menu structure

A traditional Italian menu consists of:

antipasto - hot or cold appetizers

primo ("first course"), usually consists of a hot dish like pasta, risotto, gnocchi, polenta or soup. There are usually abundant vegetarian options.

secondo ("second course"), the main dish, usually fish or meat (pasta is never the main course of a meal). Traditionally veal is the most commonly used meat, at least in the North, though beef has become more popular since World War II and wild game is very popular, particularly in Tuscany.

contorno ("side dish") may consist of a salad or vegetables. A traditional menu features salad after the main course.

dolce ("dessert")

caffè ("coffee") (espresso)

liquors/liqueurs (grappa, amaro, limoncello) sometimes referred to as ammazzacaffè ("Coffee killer")

One notable and often surprising aspect of an Italian meal, especially if eaten in an Italian home, is that the primo, or first course, is usually the more filling dish, providing most of the meal's carbohydrates, and will consist of either risotto or pasta (both being excellent sources). The secondo, or second course, which in French or British cuisine really is the main course, is often scant in comparison. The exception to this tends to be in Tuscany, where a traditional menu would see soup served as a primo and a hefty meat dish as the secondo.

Holiday Cuisine

Italians celebrate each holiday with a different cuisine, each in turn having a specific meaning.

At Christmas, Italians will celebrate the birth of Jesus serving as first course tortellini. The typical cake then is Panettone.

On Christmas Eve they have a variation of the Feast of the Seven Fishes. Then a symbolic fast is observed (the so-called "cena di magro", the "light dinner") excluding meat but including many courses which are not by any means light, based mainly on fish and other seafood, but also on snails, even frogs, which curiously enough are not considered "meat".

La Festa di San Giuseppe (St. Joseph's Day in English) is the feast day of St. Joseph. In Sicily, many Italian-American communities, and other Italian communities worldwide, thanks are given to St. Joseph ("San Giuseppe" in Italian) for preventing a famine in Sicily during the Middle Ages. The fava bean was the crop which saved the population from starvation, and is a traditional part of St. Joseph's Day altars and traditions. Other customs celebrating this festival include wearing red clothing, eating Sicilian pastries known as Zeppole and giving food to the needy.

On Easter Sunday, lamb-based dishes are commonly served throughout both northern and southern Italy. Typical at Easter Sunday in Umbria and Tuscany is also a breakfast with Salami, boiled eggs, wine and easter Cakes and pizzas.

The Mediterranean diet

The cooking of coastal southern Italians was one of the inspirations of the so-called Mediterranean diet, which is incorrectly believed to be characteristic of Italian cuisine in general. An Italian writer remarks sarcastically:

Around 1975, under the impulse of one of those new nutritional directives by which good cooking is too often influenced, the Americans discovered the so-called Mediterranean diet.... The name... even pleased Italian government officials, who [renamed it] Mediterranean cuisine. They kept the American selection, which excluded ingredients which are historically indispensable for us, such as pork meat, pork fat, butter, and, in the quantities allowed by family budgets, the noble meats, veal and beef. It wasn't accepted that our true eating habits, extending over the greatest part of our national territory, was middle European, and not the diet of coastal peoples.

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Answer 11

Not all Italian food. Not even close.  Consider risotto.  Consider pastas done with a cream sauce, or pasta with gorgonzola.  Consider polenta.

But lots of Italian food does include tomatoes ... because tomatoes are good?  It's interesting to note that tomatoes are a new-world vegetable, meaning they must have become part of the Italian food vocabulary only since the 1500s at the earliest (and the same is true of polenta, since corn is also a new-world vegetable, and peppers as well).

Answer 12

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