Campania is the home of mozzarella. In fact, by Italian law, only cheese made from the milk of the water buffalo of Campania should be bear this name; the cow's-milk cheese we call mozzarella is more rightly called fior di latte, "flower of the milk."

To most people, southern Italy is the land of red sauce, from the light salsa insalata, made with raw tomatoes marinated in olive oil and seasoned with salt and basil, to hefty, long-simmered, meat-flavored ragu. Schwartz introduces us to La Genovese, an onion-based sauce Neapolitans began making centuries before the tomato arrived from the New World so they could pair it with its soul mate, pasta.

Anyone interested in Italian food will find the more than 250 recipes and the almost overwhelming wealth of information in Naples at Table fascinating. There is history, going back to the ancient Greeks, and stories as only Schwartz can recount them. One of the best is how Zuppa Inglese may have gotten its name. Discover Woodman-Style Baked Pasta with Meat Sauce and Mushrooms; lusty Baccalà "Arrecanato," a casserole of salt cod and potatoes; an authentic Zuppa Inglese; and so much more as you travel around Campania with Schwartz, meeting chefs and home cooks from Naples and Salerno, Benevento up in the mountains, out along the Amalfi coast, and the jewel-like islands of Ischia and Capri. --Dana Jacobi