Customer Reviews

Harry's Bar Cookbook

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As a cook and literary buff, I always thought of Harry's Bar in Venice as a monument that has provided me with great inspiration.

Tucked away on a corner not far from St Mark's Square, it is quite small with low ceilings but with an incredible view of the Grand Canal from its first floor. The decor is very relaxing with small comfortable chairs and tables in pleasant shades of apricot and cream. Upon opening the doors, you immediately drink in the atmosphere that is intimate, worldly, historically rich and alive.

I remember the first time I visited Harry's bar twenty-five years ago. I went to this legendary bar, made famous by Ernest Hemingway, after having promised myself that I would only have a drink. I knew the prices would be outrageous for someone on a student budget since Harry's Bar had enjoyed an international reputation since 1931. But the moment that last sip of wine was out of my glass, I had to ask for a table. I do not remember what I had for lunch that day at Harry's Bar. I do remember though, how impressed I was by the quality of the house wine, the simple presentation of the food that tasted wonderful and the professional and friendly service with which the Harry's Bar staff made sure that this was going to be a memorable experience for me. So, Harry's Bar became part of my growing up and thus gained a significant importance in my life.

Ernest Hemingway used to have his own table in one corner of Harry's Bar. At the end of World War II, Hemingway dedicated to the bar a page of his famous novel "Across the River and into the Trees." The list of famous people who frequented Harry's Bar is long and impressive. Arturo Toscanini, Guglielmo Marconi, Charlie Chaplin, Truman Capote, Orson Welles, Baron Philippe de Rothschild, Princess Aspasia of Greece, Aristotle Onassis, Barbara Hutton, Peggy Guggenheim and Woody Allen, just to mention a few.

Harry's Bar opened in 1931 when Giuseppe Cipriani, an enterprising bartender at the Hotel Europa in Venice, was rewarded for his earlier generosity to a rich, young American from Boston named Harry Pickering. Pickering had been a customer at the Hotel Europa for some time, then suddenly stopped frequenting the hotel bar. One day, the elder Cipriani asked Pickering why he no longer patronized the bar. Pickering was broke, he explained to the bartender -- his family cut him off when it was discovered he had not curtailed his recklessness and fondness for drinking. So, Cipriani loaned his patron $5,000 U.S. so that Mr. Pickering could pay his hotel and bar bill as well as his cost of transportation home and ... have one last martini. Two years later, Pickering walked back into the Hotel Europa, ordered a drink at the bar, thanked Cipriani for the loan and handed him enough money to repay the loan and enable Cipriani to open his own bar.

In 1991, Giuseppe's son, Arrigo Cipriani, assembled a book of recipes: "The Harry's Bar Cookbook" (Bantam Books). The book contains more than 200 original recipes, more than 125 lavish full color photographs, wonderful anecdotes and insight into the nuances of classic Italian cuisine and their philosophy of entertaining.

During the 1930s and 1940s, founder Giuseppe Cipriani created many of the dishes still served today. Giuseppe invented the Bellini and the Montgomery cocktails. The Bellini, contains white peach pulp, juice and Prosecco (an Italian sparkling wine). Giuseppe is said to have invented it in 1948, and named the drink for the Renaissance painter Giovanni Bellini whose works were exhibited in Venice that year. The Montgomery, as Hemingway called it, is a very dry martini with a proportion of gin to vermouth of fifteen to one - the same proportion that the famed British General Bernard Montgomery was said to have endured when he lead his soldiers to fight against the enemy during World War II.

Other classics include: hot sandwiches; shrimp sandwiches (favorites of Orson Welles and Truman Capote); egg pasta with ham au gratin; risotto; and Carpaccio which is the most popular dish served at Harry's Bar. Consisting of paper-thin sheets of raw filet mignon, seasoned with a light white sauce, the Carpaccio, according to the bar's legend, was inspired by one of Cipriani's regular customers, the Countess Amalia Nani Mocenigo, whose doctor prohibited her from eating cooked meat. The dish was named after the celebrated Renaissance Venetian painter Vittore Carpaccio, famous for his use of bright red-and-white colors.

The "Harry's Bar Cookbook" is a beautiful book to own and a great inspiration for the creation of meals tantalizing to the palate. The recipes are innovative, well written and they work! This cookbook is the second best thing to having lunch at Harry's Bar, but with the stories in the book and your dreamy imagination, it's almost like being there!

The beauty of the recipes lies in their simplicity, their adaptability to a range of dining styles from elegant to informal and their memorable flavor. I hope you enjoy this cookbook as much as we do in our home.

I have been a serious student of cooking for the past 25 years. I have focused on Italian cooking for 10 of the last 25 years after my first trip to Italy.

Harry's Bar in Venice is one of those places that everyone wants to visit at least once. The restaurant does not disappoint and neither does the cookbook. If I had to pair down my Italian cookbook collection (which is now well over 50 cookbooks) this book would be in my top 5. Each recipe in the book that I have tried has been perfect. Even if you normally tinker with recipes, as I usually do, try these just as they are written at least once. I don't think that you will be disappointed.

I appreciate the fact that the book is authentic, as opposed to the Italian-American books that are normally available in America. This book is packed full of fabulous recipes, each one better than the last. The pictures of the recipes are beautiful as the photos of Venice.

This book will be a wonderful addition to anyone's cookbook collection. This would also make a fabulous gift for a lover of either Italy or cooking.

This is a great book. Not only does it capture the spirit of the famous Venetian bar at a fraction of the cost of an actual visit, the recipes are surprisingly easy and, for the most part, quite manageable by the home cook. There are very few hard to find ingredients, the methods are mostly straight forward, and the results most pleasing. Arrigo Cipriani stresses the Harry's is indeed a bar, and not primarily a fine dining restaurant. This does not mean that the food is not fine, rather it means that the food is very fresh, typical, simple Italian fare. The sort of food that has made the many cuisines of Italy so popular all over the world. The recipes give readers the opportunity to reproduce this type of food wherever they live.
If you wish to be vicariously transported to Venice, with some minimal cooking and cocktail mixing competence you can be in Harry's at least in your mind's eye.

My parents loved Harry's in the 1950s. I never knew why until I visited the bar in Venice myself in the 1980s. I cook a fair amount, so I often use someone's recipe just as a taking off point. I frequently think I can outcook most authors. Not so with Harry. Like Paul Bocuse, this is one of a few cookbooks where you should try to follow the recipe precisely. The world's best osso bucco, the best scampi fritto which anyone can cook and stun your friends, tuna fish mousse to startle you, the best sauteed mushrooms, and the world's best club sandwich. What else can you ask? If he says cut the tomato sideways in three even slices, try it. He does not waste words, and he does know how to cook.

March 23 I try to go there and celebrate my father's birthday. Mr. Cipriani celebrates his fatther too. I've never met him, but maybe that's another thing we have in common.

This book provides the best recipes for regional Italian cooking I have ever used. They are simple to follow, reasonable in the produce suggested, and they invariably taste fantastic.

My wife and I went to Harry's in New York, we can't wait to get back to Venice to try out the original.

I discovered this book at a client's house (Upper East Side, New York City) and was blown away with the dishes made from this book. Combine the great dishes with a book that you can actually cook from; this makes this puchase a no brainer for the fans of italian.

I think, also, that Amazon may have a mistake with Nigella Lawson doing the foreward? Even the book cover pictured says it's Michael Winner. I don't know if this has been updated once inside, but it appears to be the same book with a different publisher. It's also more expensive than the 1991 version from Bantam Books. Great book, by the way.

This book offers such wonderful recipes and a great story too! I like reading about the history of the restaurant which is absolutely wonderful. Can't wait to go back. The book is great, and the recipes are basic and easy to follow. Wonderful find for anyone who enoys cooking and loves to eat!

Like the best Italian food, the recipes in Harry's Bar Cookbook will not blow you away with their complexity. Most of the recipes for both drinks and food are relatively simple. The recipe for their famous bellini, for example, consists of two ingredients--champagne and peach juice. But the key to the recipes are their reminders about and reliance upon using the very best ingredients. And that's the key. The book has an air of confidence about it, not arrogance, but confidence, that comes from satisfying drinkers and diners for so long. All of the background, history, hints, and asides that come with the recipes enrich those and make you wish you could be in Venice savoring the food and the atmosphere. A quality cookbook.

I have had this cookbook for years and have made many of the recipes. The recipes always turn out fantastic and are enjoyed by family and friends. The book abounds with classic recipes from a restaurant that knows how to treat it's customers. The pictures are a joy and definitely add to the pleasure of just browsing through the book. A really great cookbook and story of a remarkable restaurant.