Melanzane alla Parmigiana, or La parmigiana di melanzane (Eggplant Parmesan) is a classic recipe from the Campania region. Marika shows us how to make it, one step at a time.

Gualtiero Marchesi, together with his friend Medagliani, figured out how to invent new kinds of pots and pans to make the most of his new recipes.

Gualtiero Marchesi's restaurant was more akin to an art exhibit, than a place where you can get something to eat.

Gualtiero Marchesi tells us a bit about when he discovered "haute cuisine" in a famous hotel school in Switzerland.

Gualtiero Marchesi has been described as growing up in a pot. While training under the eye of his mother, he began to specialize in tavola calda e fredda (hot and cold food service) which, usually connected with a bar, offers quality ready-to-eat dishes. La Cucina Italiana (Italian Cooking) is a periodical that's been on newsstands since 1929. Paola Ricas, who was an editor there, shares a special moment in its history.

Although Marchesi earned his first Michelin star quite early in the game, he never lost his enthusiasm for creating new dishes, for experimenting.

Our chef tells how his passion for cooking was born, and what books he used as examples.

Gualtiero Marchesi talks about the hotel/restaurant his parents opened in Milan. He describes what it was like back in the Fifties.

Marchesi completely upsets the traditional concepts of cooking, and many think he's just too weird in his combinations and cooking times.

We open a new chapter in L’arte della cucina (the Art of Cooking). Here the focus is on Milan, and the fruit and vegetable market where it all starts.

Gualtiero put some very fancy lamps in his new restaurant, but it stayed almost empty for a good while. He didn't give up, nor did he stoop to using the techniques a New York restaurant used when it opened.

Fashion designer Chiara Boni talks about Milan in the seventies. Gualtiero Marchesi talks about combining tradition with innovation in both his art and his kitchen. Gastronomer Eugenio Medagliani talks about how at the beginning, people understood very little about this "nouvelle cuisine."

The sixties and seventies were magical years for Milan. Fashion design started undergoing important changes, and people started talking about food!

Gualtiero's friends continue telling the story of the 1970s, when he finally opened his restaurant, on the via Bonvesin de la Riva in Milan. It was rough.

Marchesi recounts how he transformed some dark basement rooms in Milan into a modern style restaurant that eventually made history.