Laura Schenone's book-length essay is an expertly crafted exposition of her search for family history, for barely-surviving traditions, for connections to immigrant ancestors who were strangers to her. She is, by her own admission, "obsessed" with replicating the ravioli of her great-grandmother. She longs for authenticity, for real nourishment in a world of "silver wrapped", mass produced cream cheese. She longs to know who they were, this Genovese couple who came to New Jersey from the isolated, breathtakingly beautiful mountains of Italy so many years ago.

Immersed in the demanding cycles of domesticity, raising two young sons, it is in the chores and delights of the kitchen that she recognizes her mission and begins her quest.

This book speaks to the the mystery of generation, the families who spring forth, the gathering around the table on feast days, and on ordinary days as well. The mothers nourish so that the families may flourish. Schenone's masterful prose absorbed me. I could not put this book down.

I ate this book up and still wanted more. I am 1/2 Italian as well, the same age as the author, have 2 boys as does the author, and have what I thought was the only mixed up crazy family. I chose education and career over learning how to cook, so I loved hearing about her search. Laura write a sequel! More pictures!

This is one of the oddest books I have ever read and I recommend it to anyone -not just food lovers. It kept me facinated until the end. One of those books which enlightens one to the small but exciting adventures people can find themselves caught up with. You don't have to be a movie star or run for president to find some exciting things in your own life. Laura Schenone did this and brought the reader along with her. I don't know this lady but it would be fun having her for a neighbor - especially for Christmas ravioli.

Schenone has written a mesmerizing meditation on food that is a mystery, a memoir and a love letter to ravioli all at once. The book made me wish I had Italian ancestors, so I could go hop a plane and explore the mountains of Italy to track down secret recipes, and hidden family lore, too. Instead I made the walnut sauce--which was delicious. This book is a beautiful and honest memoir about a woman's search to understand her family and herself. Honestly, I didn't want the journey to end.

I love this book! It is a little bit cooking, a little bit history, a little bit travel, a little bit genealogy, a little bit family drama. I had borrowed a copy from my local library, and I enjoyed it so much that I had to buy it.
I am intending to try some of the recipes and make my own ravioli.(My all time favorite food)

Lending libraries strong in culinary history, particularly American regional dishes, will delight in THE LOST RAVIOLI RECIPES OF HOBOKEN, based on the author's quest for a great grandmother's recipe for ravioli. Her journey takes her to family history and archives, surveys conflicting ideas of culinary history, and journeys from New Jersey's suburbs to her Italian ancestors' home. The result's a lively food history not to be missed.

THE LOST RAVIOLI RECIPES OF HOBOKEN is a marvelously well written "search for identity" rumination. If it has any fault it is that is takes itself so seriously that the reader is afraid to smile too broadly.

It's rare in the food writing genre to find an accomplished literary writer who is also a smart, talented and creative cook, and that's what readers will find in Schenone's new memoir. As a former pastry chef, author of a food memoir and fellow writer, I was smitten with the book from the opening line which is both poetic and evocative. From there, it's a page turner. Schenone is an entirely sympathetic and engagingly curious and thoughtful narrator whose voice is graceful and compelling. I enjoyed her journey from overwhelmed mother of two trying in vain to duplicate her family's famous Christmas ravioli from a cryptic recipe, to intrepid traveler seeking out the origins of the dish, to her final transformation into someone with a deeper understanding of cooking, life, family and these precious handed-down recipes we all treasure but often find baffling and inconsistent with modern life. Her constant soul-searching is fascinating as she sets out on her quest to find the real, authentic ravioli recipe, as are her descriptions of the Italian cooks and their kitchens that she pursues to satisfy a genuine craving for answers; why did her ancestors use something as ordinary as cream cheese in an otherwise authentic recipe for ravioli? What was the original use for the exotic and fascinating old ravioli tool that hung in her childhood home? Is she an 'authentic" Italian, or only a confusing diluted mix of heritages without a strong identity? What can she do to get her children (described here beautifully, foibles and imaginary friends and all)to appreciate "real" food? I could not put this book down and I doubt anyone with a love of old recipes, family stories, quests for something bigger than ourselves, or a yen for a food memoir written with passion and integrity could either. It's on my list of the best books of the year.

This was a gift for my daughter who lives in New Jersey. She read the book and will be using the recipes. My daughter said the book was most interesting.

"The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken" is more than some promenade through the streets of Jersey, it is a journey to which Laura Schenone enlivens our senses. She captures the essence of her Italian (Genoese) American heritage so fully and completely you can seemingly taste the foods right off the pages. Romantic and inviting - describes her words about her family where she poetically sits you down at the dinner table as if you were one of theirs...it is heartfelt!

She vividly gives us the many and varied historical origins of pasta, taking us to places with our imagination as we sweep through time and geographical locales. The recipes "ala cookbook" is an added treat. Of course, a recipe is a recipe unless one adds their heart and soul, to which Laura has done so openly with this book that not only is it a required read if you are at all interested in food, but a must for your cookbook library.

Randy Shamlian (author of "A Slice of Apple Pie")A Slice of Apple Pie

This is a wonderful book on many different levels. A basic clue in the mystery is a pack of Philadelphia Cream cheese listed as an ingredient in a family recipe for ravioli. That cream cheese turns up from time to time in the author's five year search for the "real" version from her Ligurian ancestors. For example, a silver pack of cream cheese shows up unexpectedly among dozens of authentic cheeses in a specialty shop in Genoa, but there are many other surprises for the author and the reader in this wonderful book.

She makes one basic point: Italy had a great cuisine in the 1800s and 1900s, but it was reserved primarily for the wealthy and the nobility. Common people ate a very different, less complex cuisine, and poorer people immigrated to the US. Here they created a new cuisine, a reflection, but not a duplicate, of the "Italian cuisine" of their homeland. Schenone demonstrates the point several times during the course of this fascinating book.

It won't spoil the mystery in any way to tell you how Schenone's great grandmother actually did it. Reading how Schenone figured it out makes this one of the best food books I've ever read.

Basic Pasta Dough for Ravioli
Sfoglia per i ravioli/Sfogie per i ravieu

Yield: 1 pound pasta

1 cup 00 flour (if not available, use all-purpose)
1 cup all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting work surface
1¿2 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 egg
tepid water, beginning with 4 to 6 tablespoons, adding a little at a time; you may need more depending on your flour

Making Dough By Hand

1. Pour the flours into a hill on your work surface and mix them together. Sprinkle the salt on top. Make a hole in the center so it looks like a volcano. Be sure to leave some flour at the bottom of the hole.

2. Add the oil into the hole. Next, crack the egg into the hole. Use a fork to lightly scramble the egg and then gradually pull in flour from the inside walls of this volcano. As you do this, cup your hand around the exterior walls to keep the sides from collapsing and the egg from running all over the pasta board. (If this happens, however, don't panic; just use some flour to quickly pull the egg back into the flour as best you can.)

3. Continue to scramble the egg and pull in flour a little at a time. As the egg absorbs the flour, begin to add the water, gradually. At some point soon, you will no longer have a volcano but a mass of sticky dough. Don't be shy. Abandon the fork and use your hands with confidence to gather the dough up into a ball, adding enough water as necessary, little by little, so that the dough is workable and elastic but not too sticky, as you continue to pull in the loose bits of flour on the board. If you must err with your liquid, better to be too wet than dry. You can add a little more flour later, while kneading. It's much harder to add more water.

4. As your dough comes together, it will be sticking to your fingers. (Did I say to remove your rings?) Scrape your fingers with your dough scraper. When you have a dough that you can knead, wash your hands and scrape the pasta board clear of crusty bits and gumminess so that it is smooth.

5. Knead the dough for about 8 minutes (longer for a larger batch). Generously sprinkle flour on your board as needed so that your dough is strong and absolutely not sticky. I suggest using the heels of your hands to push, then fold the dough in half, then rotate your lump a quarter turn and do it again. Everyone has a different kneading style. Get yourself into a nice rhythm. Push, fold, turn, push, fold, turn, etc.

6. When your dough is satiny, soft, and elastic, cover it with plastic wrap and let it rest for at least 20 minutes if you plan to use the pasta machine, but at least half an hour if you plan to roll on a pin. You can let it sit longer, too, as much as 2 hours. It will continue to develop flavor as it rests, and the glutens will relax so you can roll the dough without having it snap back at you.

Ravioli is Schenone's vehicle for telling a story about culinary history and about her own family's history. Not only does Schenone draw the reader in with an exploration of the ingredients and techniques for making authentic ravioli, her honest examination of family dynamics and lingering ghosts makes this an addictive read. The problem is that I keep reading the book just before going to sleep and all the talk of this wonderful Italian food makes me intensely hungry. By the time I finish the book, I'm sure that I will trying to make homemade ravioli myself!

I love a mystery. And in her `The lost ravioli recipes of Hoboken' Schenone unravels a mystery through a personal journey to "uncover the truth" behind the treasured family recipe of her great-grandmother. I was hooked from the start intellectually and emotionally (yes, the book made me laugh and cry). I think the only other book I have read remotely like `Lost ravioli' is `How to Make an American Quilt', but I connected with `Lost ravioli' even more. Maybe it is my age (similar to the author's), but certainly the superb writing and many threads that come together in Schenone's latest book. One does not need to be a foodie, an Italian-American or a New Jerseyite to devour this book. One only needs to appreciate outstanding prose and a fascinating story. My husband and I read the book aloud to each other and it is our choice for Christmas gift book this year!

This is just a stunning and thrilling exploration, suggesting as it does that even in the most mundane or everyday experience lies the seed of the entire universe, family, meaning, wisdom, heritage -- and of course tenacity. Laura Schenone writes with a compelling voice that somehow engages us to accompany her on her quest and it is so completely her quest. I picked it up and did not put it down. It's my favorite book to share with friends this Christmas season. There's something of the eternal here. I won't be making Christmas ravioli myself, but it seems as though I have just by sharing her story.

Schenone's recipe for a book is an artful blending of recipes, an analysis of related social history, insightful (never maudlin) self-reflection about the personal & familial, and about our place in that whole spice rack of experience.

I read this book because I loved A Thousand Years Over a Hot Stove: A History of American Women Told through Food, Recipes, and Remembrances. Schenone's polymathic sweep could be confusing in a lesser author's or thinker's hands, but it all comes together as satisfyingly as a perfectly-balanced four-course dinner.

This is my primary Xmas gift book this year, because no matter which angle (a memoir, a cooking guide, a family history, a history) a recipient might focus on she or he will be satisfied.

Based on the previous work of this author, I had high expectations when I purchased this book. To my suprise and delight, they were exceeded. What the author has delivered is not only a great book about food in Italy, but also a wonderful book of entertaining stories and insights into food, family, love, and generations. So, this is much more than just a book about food; it is a food book that touches the soul.

A moving, heartwarming, exciting memoir in which I could find stories, discoveries, and experiences which made me feel as if parts of the book reflected my culture and roots from the other side of the Mediterranean Sea (Eastern Med). This book has the potential to become an international bestseller. It is not just "Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken" but it is "THE" Lost Ravioli Recipe --across cultures! Wholeheartedly recommended !!!