Catena and Agata relax in the garden of Agata's baglio [Sicilian architectural form with buildings arranged around a courtyard]. They're getting ready to cook typical Sicilian dishes that Catena will include in a cookbook she's writing.

Terre d'acqua means water-lands. We are talking about the once marshy area which has now become the fertile Po valley. Gualtiero Marchesi is considered to be the founder of the new Italian cuisine, and is perhaps the best known Italian chef in the world. He begins telling us his story.

World famous chef, Gualtiero Marchesi talks about his career, his search for a total cuisine, an authentic cuisine.

Have breakfast with Adriano! He gives us a vast menu of possibilities for starting out the morning right.

Our famous chef talks about the town where he spent much of his childhood, San Zenone al Po, where two rivers meet, and where flooding has always been part of life.

Marika names some of the delicious fruits available in Italy. In general the fruits themselves are feminine, while the plants on which they grow take the masculine form.

Marika takes us through the vegetables used in Italian cooking. Buon appetito!

Pasta alla carbonara is a characteristic dish from Lazio, and more specifically, from Rome. It's made with "humble" ingredients but that doesn't prevent it from being wonderfully tasty, and a favorite with pasta lovers everywhere. This is the Adriano's own version.

Marika shows us the various pots and pans, plates and silverware used every day in Italian kitchens, dining rooms and restaurants.

Adriano finishes showing us how to make "spaghetti alla carbonara." Ingredients for 4 servings: 500 grams of pasta, 300 grams of bacon cubes, 4 eggs, extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper, Parmesan cheese, and parsley.

Pizzeria Brandi is an historic pizzeria in Naples, dating back to the seventeen seventies. Pizza Margherita, named after the Savoy queen Margherita, was invented at the pizzeria in the eighteen eighties.

Gualtiero Marchesi recalls his childhood, living along the banks of the River Po. His memories are as diverse as milking cows and seeing German bombers taking out bridges.

Giovanna, a resident of Campania, explains how tomato puree is made, and then preserved in glass jars.

Gualtiero Marchesi recalls the early years of his friendship with Aldo Calvi, when the would hunt and fish together along the Po.

Pre-war and wartime cooking, when fuel for cooking was in short supply, made raw recipes come to the fore.