More than two hundred recipes celebrate the joys of growing and cooking one's own food, offering tips on gardening, foraging for wild foods, making wine, curing meats, and putting up vegetables for winter The unifying theme of this latest volume in Knopf's impressive series is the idea of eating off the land. Giobbi, author of Italian Family Cooking (Random, 1971) and coauthor of Eat Right, Eat Well--The Italian Way ( LJ 4/15/85) lives just slightly north of New York City, but raises his own poultry, tends a large vegetable garden, makes his own wine (50 gallons at a time), forages for wild mushrooms, and cures his own prosciutto. His Italian heritage is evident both in the vibrant, colorful dishes he cooks and in the sort of frugality that turns often overlooked ingredients into delicious food. The section on fresh vegetables is appropriately lengthy; in addition, the text offers unexpected information, strong opinions, and helpful tips on a variety of topics from 'trash fish' to preserving olives, along with some 200 seasonal recipes. For most collections. BOMC alternate. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. Another personal and personable collection of mostly Italian (and Italian-American) recipes from the artist-author of Italian Family Cooking. Like his parents and grandparents and theirs, Giobbi grows his own vegetables, raises his own chickens, gathers his own mushrooms, cans his own tuna, and makes his own wine and sausages (but uses dried pasta and scorns the gluey stuff now sold as ``fresh''). His recipes are simple and seasonal but never clich‚d, and his advice is useful, down-to-earth, and informed by his own sensuous appreciation for good-tasting real food. Aptly named, his new book is a genuine pleasure. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.