Gaccetta’s Generations Of Good Food is a collection of straightforward recipes and heartfelt stories of Italian life that brought families together around the table.
Sure, there are newer ones—a whole internet full of them. But heirloom recipes are essential to your family legacy and a priceless gift to leave your children (and theirs). And for Eleanor and her Italian family, their recipes are necessary to their traditions.
Thus, her book Generations Of Good Food is a big part of the legacy she wants to leave to the generation of would-be Italian cooks who come after her.
Book Snippet
This book is a compilation of recipes that span six generations. The book is a collection of straightforward recipes and heartfelt stories of Italian life that brought families together around the table. The cookbook is a compilation of nearly two hundred recipes, including main dishes, bread, cakes, pies, cookies, and candy. Would you like to cook pasta dishes, bake sweet Easter bread, a Chiffon cake, lemon ricotta cookies, or make Tiger butter fudge? These and many more recipes are included.
This Generation of Good Food we love book will raise your interest whether you are a novice in the kitchen, a home cook, or a professionally trained cook. Just glancing through the table of contents will urge you to cook, bake and eat.
a. Pizzelles. Pizzelles are the Gaccetta family’s favorite. In fact, it is an Italian favorite and is considered a quintessential Italian food. You can make Pizzelles with a special iron for forming and cooking these Italian waffle cookies. This recipe is found on page 177.
b. Biscotti. For Eleanor and her family, these particular Biscotti’s are made of pecans and walnuts. For Christmas time, she suggested making this recipe with cranberries and pistachio for a colorful display. This recipe is found on page 148.
c. Lemon Ricotta Cookies. Gaccetta made them colorful as blue cookies and yellow gems. Eleanor’s Lemon Ricotta Cookies come in three flavors on her book, page 167. You can make them naked with just vanilla, lemon, or chocolate.
d. Chiffon Cake. The author mentioned that it is not an easy cake to bake, and it is a cake for the seasoned baker. Her mother always brings this cake to the Italian church festival every year, which is always a show stopper. This recipe is found on page 155.
e. Sweet Butter Cookies. This recipe (page 188) is very versatile in that one can make four different cookies from this recipe which is an excellent advantage for a particular baker who wants to make variations but does not want to get out of their comfort zones. The most general way of shaping them is crescent and rolling them into a sugar powder. You can also have a naked cookie and dip it in chocolate. If you can not move them into crescent forms, you can roll them into a bowl and have them as snowballs. You can take the snowballs and put nuts in them, and then you will have the Italian wedding cookie. Or roll it into a ball and add some jelly. This is a great recipe that can be served in many different ways.
f. Aunt Mella’s Banana Bread (page 76). This bread is an easy recipe for a beginner baker. This will always be one of the best banana bread ever. You can make it with nuts, make it without, or make it with chocolate chips. This is an excellent little recipe to have in your repertoire.
g. Creams Puffs (page 82). This is a beautiful dessert and a sure one-show-stopper! The dough for the cream puffs is called Pate a Choux. The Pate a Choux can be made big or small, and you can serve it with your next luncheon with an egg salad or whatever you want. This is also a very versatile recipe.
h. Coconut Joys (page 203) and Peanut Clusters (Page 209). These candies are Eleanor’s brothers’ favorite foods! Coconut joys can be made with nuts or jackfruits. As for peanut clusters, they are made with mixed nuts and dark chocolates.
Grab a copy of Gaccetta’s book and check out these ageless family recipes from readers like you.
Get To Know The Author
Eleanor is a Colorado native who grew up in a small farming community outside Denver. Her first book, One Caregiver’s Journey, is a memoir of her caregiving experiences and was published in 2019. In 2021 she published Generations of Good Food, which spans six generations of family recipes and honors her mother, an excellent cook, and masterful baker. Today she lives in a western suburb of Denver and enjoys an active lifestyle that includes baking, cooking, health and fitness routines, and spending time with family and friends.
