Stanley Tucci reveals a fine year of eating

Actor and globetrotting gourmand Stanley Tucci has written his fourth food book, What I Ate in One Year, a diary of his life, as a Hollywood star, along the trail of food and restaurants, imbued with his legendary charm and wit.

The Emmy and Golden Globe-winning actor has become known in recent years for his love of food and gastronomy, most notably through his acclaimed television series Searching for Italy, but he is also an accomplished author on the matter with previous books The Tucci Cookbook (2012), The Tucci Table: Cooking with Family and Friends (2014), and Taste: My Life Through Food (2021). His latest effort offers a further glimpse into his life and with a free exploration of his experiences and personal thoughts through the lens of food, makes for an entertaining read.

With deep connections to Italy, it seems natural for the book to open there while Tucci is filming Conclave, a papal thriller based on the novel by Robert Harris, in Rome. Missing his wife and children, Tucci's co-star Isabella Rossellini takes him under her wing and takes him to one of her mother Ingrid Bergman's favorite restaurants.

The book came about at the behest of publishers Simon & Schuster. With no clear idea about what to write about, Tucci sat at the blank page and the result is an intimate account of the actor's relationship with food.

“My wife said, ‘Just write what you eat,’" Tucci told The New York Times. "So I did, because I do everything she says. And it actually ended up being such a pleasure to write. It just flowed very easily. As you start to write about the mundane, you start to mine all this stuff that you didn’t know you were thinking about, or that was happening. And that’s what the book is. It’s, in essence, the passage of time through the prism of food.”

Filled with cameos from Tucci's famous friends, including Ralph Fiennes and Colin Firth, the book offers an insight into the life an A-list actor, who is obsessed with the meaning and insight gained when you pay attention to what and how and with whom you eat.