This bean and pasta dish has always taken on variations from around Italy – and even Thailand

Throughout the 1990s and into the early 2000s, under the banner of story, art and folklore, the Roman publishing house Newton Compton published a series of 27 books about regional Italian cooking. Some, such as Jeanne Carola Francesconi’s epic 1965 La Cucina Napoletana, were reprints of established books, while others were specially commissioned for the series. There is considerable variation; some of the 20 regions occupy 650 densely filled pages, sometimes spread over two volumes, while other regions have 236 pages with larger fonts, with everything in between. All of which is great, although I can’t help feeling affectionate towards the regions with 14-point font.

In the face of the vast variation of regional culinary habits, knowledge and rituals, I also feel affectionate towards the common traditions; those that are specific to a place, but at the same time that cross local and national borders, as well as for the stories of the ingredients. Take pasta e fagioli, for which beans are boiled in water with fat, maybe fragrant herbs and vegetables, then pasta is added for a dense dish that probably needs a spoon. Almost all regions (and towns and individuals) have a version that is both extremely general, and specific – white beans, potato, no rosemary in Lazio, say; lardo, sage and plenty of rosemary in Piedmont; nutmeg, bread and pasta in Liguria; lardo, marjoram, tomato and chilli in Abruzzo – inviting a sort of pick and mix. And the embracing of new ideas, too, because cooking is a living, evolving thing.