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• by:
• Ricker, Allen and Scicolone, Michele

Including the history of Neapolitan cuisine and 100 recipes created with the characters in mind, plus luscious pictures of the savory dishes, readers will be baking ziti as good as Carmela's in no time.

Nuovo Vesuvio. The family restaurant, redefined. Home to the finest in Napolitan' cuisine and Essex County's best kept secret. Now Artie Bucco, la cucina's master chef and your personal host, invites you to a special feast…with a little help from his friends.

From arancini to zabaglione, from baccalá to Quail Sinatra-style, Artie Bucco and his guests, the Sopranos and their associates, offer food lovers one hundred Avellinese-style recipes and valuable preparation tips. But that's not all! Artie also brings you a cornucopia of precious Sopranos artifacts that includes photos from the old country; the first Bucco's Vesuvio's menu from 1926; AJ's school essay on Why I Like Food; Bobby Bacala's style tips for big eaters, and much, much more. So share the big table with:

Tony Soprano, waste management executive. Most people soak a bagful of discount briquettes with lighter fluid and cook a pork chop until it's shoe leather and think they're Wolfgang Puck. Enjoy his tender Grilled Sausages sizzling with fennel or cheese. Warning: Piercing the skin is a fire hazard.

Corrado Junior Soprano, Tony's uncle. Mama always cooked. No one died of too much cholesterol or some such crap. Savor his Pasta Fazool, a toothsome marriage of cannellini beans and ditalini pasta, or Giambott', a grand-operatic vegetable medley.

Carmela Soprano, Tony's wife. If someone were sick, my inclination would be to send over a pastina and ricotta. It's healing food. Try her Baked Ziti, sinfully enriched with three cheeses, and her earthy 'Shcarole with Garlic.

Peter Paul Paulie Walnuts Gualtieri, associate of Tony Soprano. I have heard that Eskimos have fifty words for snow. We have five hundred words for food. Sink your teeth into his Eggs in Purgatory-eight eggs, bubbling tomato sauce, and an experience that's pure heaven.

As Artie says, Enjoy, with a thousand meals and a thousand laughs. Buon' appetito!