Marcella Hazan, known for her Italian cookbooks that taught their readers how to make simple Italian dishes, died at her Florida home Sunday morning. She was 89 years old.
This morning, her husband Victor Hazan wrote on Facebook, reports the Washington Post: “Marcella, my incomparable companion, died this morning a few steps away from her bed. She was the truest and best, and so was her food.”
“The world of authentic home cooking has lost a giant today,” Hazan’s daughter-in-law wrote on her Facebook page. “My mother-in-law Marcella Hazan, melted away peacefully, my father-in-law Victor, was at her side.”
Hazan gained fame for her seven bestselling Italian cookbooks, which were written in her native language of Italian by her and translated into English by her husband.
For all her fame, the LA Times reports, Hazan did not originally intend to delve into the world of cookbook writing. She attended the University of Ferrara where she earned two doctorates in biology and natural science before moving to America with her husband in the 1950s.
Once in America, she taught cooking classes to fill up her time and was discovered by New York Times food editor Craig Claiborne.
With Claiborne’s help, Hazan became popular around New York and had her first cookbook, Classic Italian Cooking published in 1973, a book which prompted many to start comparing her to famous tv chef Julia Child. Hazan’s fame only skyrocketed from there as she gained a fan following who all loved her cookbooks.
“I don’t cook ‘concepts.’ I use my head, but I cook from the heart, I cook for flavor,” Hazan wrote in 2004.
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