11 reasons we wish we were Italian

Italians might pretend it's all about what's served up at the dinner table, but the festa in the kitchen is much more important. If you're elbow-deep in flour, and there's sugo (sauce) splattered on your apron and you don't care – well you're pretty much Italian.

Melbourne Tomato Day (Photo by Mark Chew). Source: Melbourne Tomato Festival

Italian cooking is all about the basics and making it from scratch. But it's not hard! Get familiar with your Pizza-Pasta-Pesto-Passata staples and an exciting new Italian world of feasting will follow.

1. Pizza

Making pizza isn't just about cooking dinner, it's more like forging a new friendship. There will be ups and downs as you perfect your dough, but know that you'll be friends for life.

Pizza Margherita is a simple favourite, let Maeve O'Meara show you how to embrace a chargrilled crust.

Pizza margherita. Source: Food Safari Fire

2. Pasta

Same-same but oh-so different! There are endless ways to change up your spaghetti, by adding flavour (and colour!) into the pasta as well as the sauce. Let O Tama Carey's squid ink tagliatelle with mandarin and capers get you started.

Source: SBS Food

3. Pesto

A sauce in its own right, pesto can also be used to add flavour to other dishes. Let Lucio Galletto teach you how to make the 'best and creamiest' pesto in Italy, with his trenette with pesto, potato and green beans.

Source: SBS Food

4. Passata

The end of summer means passata-making season is upon us. Traditionally made in a backyard marathon of tomato washing-crushing-bottling-cooking with friends and family, it'll stock pantries for the year to come. 

Follow Gourmet Farmer Matthew Evan's passata recipe to make your own, or head to the Melbourne Tomato Festival on Sunday February 21 to see passata-making in action. There'll also be tomato-themed workshops, talks, taste-testing, cooking demonstrations and local famers selling their produce.

The humble pomodoro will also be celebrated at the Tomato Festival Sydney, February 20-21.

Source: SBS Food

5. Potato gnocchi

But is it pasta? If you answer yes, you can be an honorary Italian.

If it's not potato gnocchi, is it still gnocchi? - Hotly contested.

Sylvia Colloca will show you how to knead your dough just the right amount (not like pasta!) for her potato gnocchi with zucchini and pecorino.

Source: SBS Food

6. Polenta

Polenta is a labour of love. The corn-based polenta requires constant stirring if you don't want any lumps, but at least you'll build up your arm muscles. Serve in a layer on a plate, with a layer of pasta sauce on top. Try Matteo Bruno's veal and pork balls with polenta.

Source: SBS Food

7. Pesce

Let this fish be your trophy piece. Rachael Khoo's salt-baked golden trout with lime risotto is all about the salt, but it's not salty. There is nothing more Italian than embracing the salt.

Source: Rachel Khoo's Kitchen Notebook Melbourne

8. Pecorino

This cheese has bite. But don't just grate it over your meal, make it into the main part of your meal. Sylvia Colloca's stale bread and pecorino dumplings will rival your polpetti (meatballs).

Source: SBS Food

9. Peperoni

Vegetables are there to be stuffed! Capsicum, artichokes, and mushrooms are not just the antipasto, but can be filled to form a main meal. Try Sylvia Colloca's peperoni imbottiti.

Source: SBS Food

10. Panforte

You're full! Can't eat another thing! Except for coffee and biscotti of course. Here's Anneka Manning's chocolate orange panforte.

Source: SBS Food

11. Panna cotta

If you add liqueur to your coffee and liqueur into your desserts you're as Italian as you'll ever be.

There's no better way to spend your Valentine's Day, or UnValentine's Day, than with O Tama Carey's panna cotta with amaretto caramel.