Giada De Laurentiis visits to promote her new book.
Giada De Laurentiis has become famous in her own right, one of Food Network’s most recognizable stars, but it was another famous figure who stirred her passion for food — her grandfather Dino.
“My earliest food memory is when I was 5, making pizza dough with my grandfather,” De Laurentiis says. “My nonno [grandfather] loved cooking, loved spending time in the kitchen. I’d spend Sundays with him, and we’d have these big family suppers.”
That was when the De Laurentiis clan lived on the outskirts of Rome, after Dino had become one of Italy’s biggest film producers, working with directors such as Federico Fellini and Roberto Rossellini, and had branched into Hollywood, producing films as varied as “Serpico,” “Death Wish” and a 1976 remake of “King Kong.”
When Giada was 8, in the late 1970s, the family moved to the United States, first to New York and ultimately to Los Angeles. The lifestyle changed, less centered on relaxed, rustic meals and extended family, but the Sunday suppers endured. “They were smaller, pared down,” De Laurentiis recalls.
De Laurentiis pays tribute to the early days of her youth with her latest cookbook, “Giada’s Italy: My Recipes for La Dolce Vita,” released this week by publisher Clarkson Potter.
“I wanted to reconnect with my roots,” De Laurentiis, 47, says in a recent telephone interview from Los Angeles. “All my books are Italian inspired, but they were California themed. This one is an homage to the city where I was born.” She says the book was special to write and research because she spent weeks in Rome with her 10-year-old daughter, Jade, and 68-year-old mother. “We really got to soak in the feel of the city,” she says. “And it was great to be with my daughter, because they’re like buddies at this age. They understand so much of what’s going on around them.”
De Larentiis will be in South Florida to talk about the book and her Italian childhood on April 5 and April 6. De Laurentiis will appear at the David Posnack Jewish Community Center in Davie at 1 p.m. today (tickets are $36 at the door and include a signed book), at the Chapman Conference Center at Miami-Dade College in Miami at 7:30 tonight (tickets are $35 plus fees at eventbrite.com and include a signed book), and at Williams-Sonoma at the The Gardens Mall in Palm Beach Gardens at 6 p.m. Friday (tickets are $35 plus fees at eventbrite.com and include a signed book).