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Cooks and their Books: Manuela Darling-Gansser
SBS Food catches up with inveterate traveller and passionate amateur cook, Manuela Darling-Gansser as part of a series of interviews with Australia's top chefs and cooks.
Click here for a selection of recipes from Manuela’s books, Under The Olive Tree and Winter In The Alps
If you ask Manuela Darling-Gannser where her passion for food comes from, she’ll tell you it runs in her blood - all the way, perhaps, back to her great-grandfather who was a famous foodie and restaurateur in southern Switzerland more than 120 years ago.
While she was brought up in the Swiss lakeside city of Lugano, the family's cultural connections were somewhat stronger with nearby Italy than with their homeland: the language spoken at home was Italian, as was the food served up at meal times, and summers were spent holidaying on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia.
Manuela's childhood - which saw her living in various far-flung cities around the world, including Tehran and Zurich, and which revolved around large family meals in a small kitchen with her parents and five siblings – ingrained in her a great enthusiasm for cooking, a zest for travel, and attuned her palette to a fusion of interesting foreign flavours.
Her foray into food writing began when she set out to record on paper some of her own recipes, and those of previous generations, for her adult children living overseas. However, what began as a modest motherly gesture soon took on a life of its own, as she realised that the food about which she wrote was inextricably linked to people, places and experiences. Under The Olive Tree – a celebration of Mediterranean summer food – was the result. The book features colourful, delicious and beautifully simple recipes set against a backdrop of relaxed Italian living and spectacular landscapes, photographed by Simon Griffiths.
Her subsequent publication, Winter In The Alps, again revists her culinary roots and family heritage, this time journeying through Switzerland in all its wintertime glory.
Both books are published by Hardie Grant Books.
Click on the audio player above to listen to Manuela talk about her love of food and travel.
You can find Manuela's website at www.manuelafoodandtravel.com.
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