Marie Mills 
Freelance
Actor and bon viveur Stanley Tucci on his love of Italian food
If you didn’t join the hordes of fans that YouTube’d Stanley Tucci’s martini tutorials throughout lockdown, you missed out. Big time. His wonderful wry smile, those signature black spectacles, the silky smooth New York accent and his serious cocktail skills became infamous among food and film fans alike. From the home he shares in Barnes with his wife, Felicity Blunt, he shook and stirred us through swathes of the pandemic and it’s his deep love for food and drink that brings us together. I meet with him to discuss his new memoir Taste: My Life Through Food. It is predominantly funny and heartwarming, but it also sheds very personal light on the cancerous tumour found under Tucci’s tongue several years back, a discovery that led to medical intervention, treatment and the possibility that he would lose his ability to taste. For someone whose life is centred around food, this discovery was devastating and only further deepened his appreciation.
With anecdotes of his childhood through to his on-set culinary adventures (we read about this introduction to whale thanks to filming in Reykjavik), and the food he loves to cook at home for family and friends, his culinary past, peppered with personal recipes, makes for a great read (he even details his “Ragu Tucci” in there). “I must admit that years ago I never thought that my passion and interest in food would come close to eclipsing how I felt about my chosen profession,” he says. But he is so consumed with good food that it’s small wonder he didn’t go into the restaurant business himself. “I always wanted a really small restaurant with a really small kitchen,” he tells me. “Just doing seasonal stuff. Nothing fancy when it comes to wine. It is a dream, but it is never going to happen.”
Stanley Tucci / Instagram
He tells me how he wrote Taste through the first lockdown. “I wrote it like I write a screenplay. You sit down, you have an idea of what is going to happen and you start writing. Some days are easier than others – some days it just flows – but I’d set myself, like, 1,000 words a day and aim for that. I got to moments when I’d think: ‘Why am I doing this? Who cares? Is this really interesting at all?’ And then other times I felt I really had something to say.”
The result is a deliciously funny history of Tucci food, recipes readers can use themselves at home, recollections of his early years in New York, the passing of his first wife, Kate, and his experiences of fatherhood. But I am curious: was it getting sick and facing the idea he wouldn’t taste again that ultimately made him write the book? “I’d thought about doing a book,” he muses, “but not a memoir. Maybe stories about food that would end up being a collection of observations about food interspersed with sketches and recipes, but then I was convinced to write a memoir. And it made complete sense to write it as I did,” he says laughing, “because my life is just about food.”
There was no one defining moment for Tucci that made him love food, however. “From the time I was little, people put great food in front of me and would tell me why I should eat it. And how I ate it! There was no moment for me that made me love food. Whenever I would get sick as a kid, not being able to eat was really frustrating for me. I remember having stomach flu in Italy and I couldn’t eat for three or four days and I had a deep craving for these potato croquettes my mother made – they aren’t like Spanish croquettes and they were really simple – but I remember that was all I wanted. It’s those moments that sort of stand out.”
His love of the British restaurant scene is evident. “Riva, here in Barnes, is great. I also go to Giorgio Locatelli’s, Sartoria, Scott’s – because I love how old-school it is and it looks so beautiful – and the Delaunay and the Wolseley, and then the little Soho places like Duck Soup, and Sabor is incredible. Incredible. [Nieves Barragon] is one of the nicest people ever. Americans cannot tease the Brits about having bad food. I’ve been here eight years now and the restaurant scene is so exciting here.”
Though, given Tucci’s Italian lineage, it is Italian fare that dominates both his writing and our conversation. He is currently filming more of his CNN series, Searching For Italy, which is proving highly popular, though he is now doing an episode here in the UK. “We couldn’t go to Italy [due to Covid restrictions] so we decided to do one here, because there are about 400,000 Italians in the UK now. If you go to an Italian restaurant here, it’ll be full of Italians. Actual Italians. So we’re going to look at what they’re doing here, the great delicatessens and why young Italians are coming here. I found an amazing woman who is making mozzarella here using British produce. CNN approached me and one of the ideas I gave them was about breaking down Italian food region by region and exploring the reason why each region has the food it does, looking at topography, history, socioeconomics; all of that was really interesting to me. I’m going to cook with Gennaro [Contaldo] for an episode. He is the loveliest man ever.”
Unsurprisingly, he has a deep love for the country, but is hard pushed to pick a top spot. “I really love the north. I love the climate. Emilia-Romagna, let’s face it, is pretty incredible when it comes to cuisine – the tortellini and the prosciutto, the lasagna Bolognese, it’s hard to beat. And the Amalfi coast, Umbria, Sardinia, and Rome… it’s impossible to choose a favourite place.”
But being based in London he isn’t stuck for places to source good Italian food, he tells me. Valentina in Sheen is “great. Sheen is cool. I Camisa in Soho and Linaare excellent. Eataly opened in Liverpool Street – I haven’t been yet but it was started in Milan and it’s heaven. If heaven were an Italian eatery it would be Eataly. And it’s huge. You can’t fathom how much they stock and the little restaurants and bars peppered inside. It’s staggering and there is nothing you can’t get there that is Italian.” If forced to choose a last meal, he admits it “might be lasagna Bolognese. In Emilia-Romagna I think I ate it every day.”
And only ever one more cocktail? “A martini. I can just about have them now if I make them properly because my throat was so messed up from the [cancer] treatment – I don’t have all my saliva and it is incredibly sensitive, let’s put it that way – so if you have something sparkling, it still makes me sick because it’s like little needles stabbing me. And that’s just sparkling water, not even Champagne, so something super harsh has to be watered down. But a martini is good because you have to dilute it and, when made properly, it’s fine.”
So what tips does Mr Tucci have for us with regards to his favourite cocktail, the martini? “I recently went to The Connaught and we shot some stuff for Tanqueray, which was really fun and the bartender there, Augustino [Perrone]was a lovely, funny guy and he taught me a couple of really great things. I stir my martinis, as does he, but he taught me to hold the spoon and place it behind the ice so you get a silent stir. It’s beautiful and mixes it perfectly. They make their own vermouth by combining three different types – they are all white, but they are different and that matters because there isn’t one flavour profile. It hits different notes with a perfect balance. Having clear ice is also key. You have to freeze it slowly so it doesn’t become cloudy. It’s much cleaner.”
Taste: My Life Through Food by Stanley Tucci (Fig Tree, £20) is out now.
Now read
Stanley Tucci on his love for food and Italian heritage
The 21 best cookbooks to buy in 2021
GQ Food & Drink Awards 2022: vote for your favourites
If you didn’t join the hordes of fans that YouTube’d Stanley Tucci’s martini tutorials throughout lockdown, you missed out. Big time. His wonderful wry smile, those signature black spectacles, the silky smooth New York accent and his serious cocktail skills became infamous among food and film fans alike. From the home he shares in Barnes with his wife, Felicity Blunt, he shook and stirred us through swathes of the pandemic and it’s his deep love for food and drink that brings us together. I meet with him to discuss his new memoir Taste: My Life Through Food. It is predominantly funny and heartwarming, but it also sheds very personal light on the cancerous tumour found under Tucci’s tongue several years back, a discovery that led to medical intervention, treatment and the possibility that he would lose his ability to taste. For someone whose life is centred around food, this discovery was devastating and only further deepened his appreciation.
With anecdotes of his childhood through to his on-set culinary adventures (we read about this introduction to whale thanks to filming in Reykjavik), and the food he loves to cook at home for family and friends, his culinary past, peppered with personal recipes, makes for a great read (he even details his “Ragu Tucci” in there). “I must admit that years ago I never thought that my passion and interest in food would come close to eclipsing how I felt about my chosen profession,” he says. But he is so consumed with good food that it’s small wonder he didn’t go into the restaurant business himself. “I always wanted a really small restaurant with a really small kitchen,” he tells me. “Just doing seasonal stuff. Nothing fancy when it comes to wine. It is a dream, but it is never going to happen.”
Stanley Tucci / Instagram
He tells me how he wrote Taste through the first lockdown. “I wrote it like I write a screenplay. You sit down, you have an idea of what is going to happen and you start writing. Some days are easier than others – some days it just flows – but I’d set myself, like, 1,000 words a day and aim for that. I got to moments when I’d think: ‘Why am I doing this? Who cares? Is this really interesting at all?’ And then other times I felt I really had something to say.”
The result is a deliciously funny history of Tucci food, recipes readers can use themselves at home, recollections of his early years in New York, the passing of his first wife, Kate, and his experiences of fatherhood. But I am curious: was it getting sick and facing the idea he wouldn’t taste again that ultimately made him write the book? “I’d thought about doing a book,” he muses, “but not a memoir. Maybe stories about food that would end up being a collection of observations about food interspersed with sketches and recipes, but then I was convinced to write a memoir. And it made complete sense to write it as I did,” he says laughing, “because my life is just about food.”
There was no one defining moment for Tucci that made him love food, however. “From the time I was little, people put great food in front of me and would tell me why I should eat it. And how I ate it! There was no moment for me that made me love food. Whenever I would get sick as a kid, not being able to eat was really frustrating for me. I remember having stomach flu in Italy and I couldn’t eat for three or four days and I had a deep craving for these potato croquettes my mother made – they aren’t like Spanish croquettes and they were really simple – but I remember that was all I wanted. It’s those moments that sort of stand out.”
His love of the British restaurant scene is evident. “Riva, here in Barnes, is great. I also go to Giorgio Locatelli’s, Sartoria, Scott’s – because I love how old-school it is and it looks so beautiful – and the Delaunay and the Wolseley, and then the little Soho places like Duck Soup, and Sabor is incredible. Incredible. [Nieves Barragon] is one of the nicest people ever. Americans cannot tease the Brits about having bad food. I’ve been here eight years now and the restaurant scene is so exciting here.”
Though, given Tucci’s Italian lineage, it is Italian fare that dominates both his writing and our conversation. He is currently filming more of his CNN series, Searching For Italy, which is proving highly popular, though he is now doing an episode here in the UK. “We couldn’t go to Italy [due to Covid restrictions] so we decided to do one here, because there are about 400,000 Italians in the UK now. If you go to an Italian restaurant here, it’ll be full of Italians. Actual Italians. So we’re going to look at what they’re doing here, the great delicatessens and why young Italians are coming here. I found an amazing woman who is making mozzarella here using British produce. CNN approached me and one of the ideas I gave them was about breaking down Italian food region by region and exploring the reason why each region has the food it does, looking at topography, history, socioeconomics; all of that was really interesting to me. I’m going to cook with Gennaro [Contaldo] for an episode. He is the loveliest man ever.”
Unsurprisingly, he has a deep love for the country, but is hard pushed to pick a top spot. “I really love the north. I love the climate. Emilia-Romagna, let’s face it, is pretty incredible when it comes to cuisine – the tortellini and the prosciutto, the lasagna Bolognese, it’s hard to beat. And the Amalfi coast, Umbria, Sardinia, and Rome… it’s impossible to choose a favourite place.”
But being based in London he isn’t stuck for places to source good Italian food, he tells me. Valentina in Sheen is “great. Sheen is cool. I Camisa in Soho and Linaare excellent. Eataly opened in Liverpool Street – I haven’t been yet but it was started in Milan and it’s heaven. If heaven were an Italian eatery it would be Eataly. And it’s huge. You can’t fathom how much they stock and the little restaurants and bars peppered inside. It’s staggering and there is nothing you can’t get there that is Italian.” If forced to choose a last meal, he admits it “might be lasagna Bolognese. In Emilia-Romagna I think I ate it every day.”
And only ever one more cocktail? “A martini. I can just about have them now if I make them properly because my throat was so messed up from the [cancer] treatment – I don’t have all my saliva and it is incredibly sensitive, let’s put it that way – so if you have something sparkling, it still makes me sick because it’s like little needles stabbing me. And that’s just sparkling water, not even Champagne, so something super harsh has to be watered down. But a martini is good because you have to dilute it and, when made properly, it’s fine.”
So what tips does Mr Tucci have for us with regards to his favourite cocktail, the martini? “I recently went to The Connaught and we shot some stuff for Tanqueray, which was really fun and the bartender there, Augustino [Perrone]was a lovely, funny guy and he taught me a couple of really great things. I stir my martinis, as does he, but he taught me to hold the spoon and place it behind the ice so you get a silent stir. It’s beautiful and mixes it perfectly. They make their own vermouth by combining three different types – they are all white, but they are different and that matters because there isn’t one flavour profile. It hits different notes with a perfect balance. Having clear ice is also key. You have to freeze it slowly so it doesn’t become cloudy. It’s much cleaner.”
Taste: My Life Through Food by Stanley Tucci (Fig Tree, £20) is out now.
Now read
Stanley Tucci on his love for food and Italian heritage
The 21 best cookbooks to buy in 2021
GQ Food & Drink Awards 2022: vote for your favourites
