When our daughter, Emilia, was little, we wanted to stay connected to Italy and show her the country that had given us so much inspiration for what we do. Her love of the water and spaghetti with clams led us to seek out Italian beach vacations. That search brought us to the discovery of the Lido, the traditional Italian beach club, which we quickly came to believe was the most perfect way to experience summer in Italy.
Like most things Italian, there is an art to a day at the beach. There, we found everything we cherish about Italian culture: amazing cuisine, warm hospitality, beautiful scenery, and insight into the pulse of true Italian life. We returned year after year, traveling to different regions, visiting different beach clubs, and creating warm memories.
When COVID forced everyone into lockdown, we dreamt of those experiences and longed for the joy of the Italian beach clubs. So on a cold winter hike, isolated in the woods, the idea for Lido was born. We spent the next couple of months in lockdown shaping the first pages, and once life returned to normal and travel opened up again, we traveled to Italy and spent a few weeks exploring beach clubs, which solidified our belief in pursuing the idea of writing a lifestyle cookbook about Italian beach clubs
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We found an agent, wrote a proposal, and discovered a truly perfect match in our publisher, Hardie Grant. Our research for the book took us back and forth to Italy over the course of a year. With our daughter in tow, and cameras, notebooks, and beach bags in hand we traveled the country in search of the very best of Italy’s lidos. Whether tucked into sheltered coves in the north or lining the sandy and pebbled beaches of the central coast, we wrote, photographed, and savored the food, all in pursuit of capturing the essence of a perfect day on the Italian coast.
Returning home, we polished our writing, edited our photographs, and got to cooking. Recreating the dishes we’d experienced along the way, we transformed our kitchen into an Italian beach restaurant, testing, replicating, and gently tweaking each recipe for the home cook.
Finally, our years of travel and research have culminated into something we are very proud of and Lido is an indispensable resource for anyone dreaming about their latest trip to Italy, as well as those planning their next. It is an intoxicating tour of Italy’s beach clubs, with photographs so vivid you can practically smell the suntan lotion and taste the fried seafood platter through the books more than one hundred photographs and delicious coastal-inspired recipes.
Part One of this transportive exploration of Italy’s beach clubs is your passport to some of the most sought-after lidos across the country. Part Two brings the experience home, sharing recipes inspired by long, sun-soaked days spent lingering at lido restaurants.
While traditional Italian cuisine is deeply regional, there is a striking similarity on the menus of these beach clubs. Here, dishes are shaped less by geography and more by a shared coastal spirit, with seafood as the unifying thread. You may not be able to bring the blue-and-white striped umbrellas home with you, but you can recreate the Lambrusco Spritz, roasted fennel salad with warm olive vinaigrette, casarecce with pesto and crispy calamari, and the flavors you savored beneath them.
So grab your towel and claim your spot under the umbrella. The salty-sweet air and azure waters of Italy’s lidos await.
Lido: Recipes and Stories from Italy's Beach Clubs is available here.
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