Carmela's Cucina Povera: A journey of self-discovery and healing through Sicilian cooking

Carmela D'Amore, explores her Sicilian heritage and finds her true cultural identity through the Italian cooking style of Cucina Povera. Readers are taken on her journey of self-discovery and acceptance, as she remembers and recreates her beloved family recipes from generations past. Carmela revisits her teenage years as a Sicilian Australian growing up in Melbourne's South Eastern suburbs and the struggles she faced, straddling two very different cultures. She shares the emotional journey she undertook to reconnect with her cultural origins and embrace her Australian identity. She finds inner joy and peace, revisiting childhood memories, good and bad, and reigniting the flame of her Sicilian culture. In the book, Carmela comes face to face with many of the struggles she encountered navigating a clash of cultures and the intergenerational challenges within her own close-knit family. In her journey to understand and embrace Australian life, Carmela illustrates how she became comfortable in her Sicilian and Australian 'skins', to embrace her new cultural identity that remembers the past and has a future rich with possibility and potential. Bringing over 40 years' expertise with the Sicilian cooking technique of Cucina Povera to Carmela's Cucina Povera, she has placed her own, modern twist on Cucina Povera recipes which she has masterfully recreated - and she shows a generosity in sharing over 75 soulful recipes with readers.