Winter In Tuscany By Amber Guinness
Amber Guinness’ latest cookbook, Winter in Tuscany, brings the region’s cosy autumn and winter flavours into our kitchens, guided by quanto basta—the intuitive Italian art of ‘just enough’.
Words HANDE RENSHAW Photos VALENTINA SOLFRINI
‘The ability to make do with what is at hand —l’rate di arrangiarsi— means that for every traditional ‘Tuscan’ dish, there is no one definitive version or recipe, despite what some might claim,’ shares Amber Guinness.
Florentine apple ‘pancake’ cake from the pages of Winter In Tuscany—recipe shared below!
‘Tuscany’s frank, rugged and decisive flavours are unapologetically celebrated now more than ever, though they have been appreciated throughout history.’
“I have always loved winter. These are the month’s when Tuscany’s best-known dishes come into their own...’”
Torta al cioccolato con amarene—Chocolate and Amarena cherry cake with ricotta.
Insalata di radicchio e arance rosse—Pink radicchio and blood orange salad.
Amber Guinness’ new cookbook, Winter in Tuscany, is an invitation to cook (and live) by feel—anchored in the Tuscan off-season when kitchens slow, markets lean into hearty produce, and small rituals take centre stage.
Across the book’s pages, Amber steers us through villages, galleries, and kitchens, pairing travel notes with unfussy, deeply satisfying recipes and a guiding philosophy: quanto basta—just enough.
Amber explains: ‘This book is a collection of the cosy, hearty dishes I love to cook in winter, recipes that are either traditionally Tuscan or Tuscan-inspired. It's all about comforting, flavourful food for cold winter nights. But more than that, this book is about a way of cooking I truly believe in: the quanto basta method. It means “as much as you need” – a glug of olive oil instead of a tablespoon. A pinch of salt as needed. You taste as you go and adjust. Once, when I was learning to make pici with a local cook, she simply said, “We need as much flour as it takes.”
Quanto basta is less about perfection and more about presence and practicality—turning what you have into something delicious.
That ethos carries from weeknights to long lunches: artichoke omelette, chicken liver pâté crostini, lentil-and-sausage stew, bistecca fiorentina, and the ultimate green salad. When the weather cools, the offering leans into ribollita, sugo finto, red-wine spaghetti, and peposo—recipes that prize frugality, seasonality, and Tuscany’s quiet depth of flavour.
For long time followers of Amber’s work, from A House Party in Tuscany to Italian Coastal, this third book feels like a natural step: a shift from celebratory gatherings, to shoreline cooking, to the restorative rhythms of winter.
Ultimately, Winter in Tuscany resists fussy instruction in favour of intuition. It’s a reminder that a pot of beans, a bitter-leaf salad, or a pan-seared steak can be extraordinary when you trust your senses—and that ‘as much as you need’ is both a recipe note and a way to inhabit the season.
This is an edited extract from Winter In Tuscany by Amber Guinness, published by Thames & Hudson Australia. Out now
Porcini al forno con pecorino, miele e timo—Baked porcini with cheese, honey and thyme.
Winter In Tuscany by Amber Gunness is out now.
TORTA DI MELE—FLORENTINE APPLE CAKE
This cake is one of the best things on the menu of Alla Vecchia Bettola, a bustling trattoria on the south side of Florence. Its peculiarity is that it isn’t a risen sponge with apples in it, but the apples are the main ingredient and are just held together by the cake mix. That’s why you mustn’t be surprised by the proportion of apple slices to batter in the recipe. At the restaurant they make this in an enormous circular flat copper pan, but I’ve scaled down their original recipe to make it more manageable at home. You want the cake to be about 1 cm (½ inch) in height, so make it in a large cake tin or even a rectangular roasting tin that allows you to smooth it out to a thin cake – the shape it ends up won’t affect the taste. The thinness is what results in the characteristic charred and caramelised apple pancake feel.
It’s heaven on its own, or topped with vanilla ice cream.
PREPARATION: 20 minutes
COOKING: 50 minutes
Serves 4
3 large firm apples, peeled
squeeze of lemon juice
50 g (13/4 oz) caster sugar,
plus extra for sprinkling
zest of 1/2 lemon
1 organic egg
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
50 g (13/4 oz) ‘00’ flour
50 ml (13/4 fl oz) full-fat milk
50 g (13/4 oz) unsalted butter,
melted
TO SERVE
2 tablespoons icing sugar
vanilla ice cream
METHOD
Preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F) fan-forced. Butter a 24 cm (9 inch) tart or cake tin and line with baking parchment.
Cut the apples into quarters, remove the cores, then thinly slice. Toss in a bowl with a squeeze of lemon juice to stop them browning.
In a large bowl, using hand-held electric beaters, whisk together the sugar, lemon zest and egg for 1–2 minutes, until thick and pale.
Gently fold the baking powder and half the flour through. Once smooth and amalgamated, add the rest of the flour. Mix the milk through, followed by the melted butter.
Once you have a smooth, amalgamated cake batter, add the apple slices, mixing well to ensure each one is well coated in the batter.
Pour the mixture into the tart tin. There is very little batter, so use a spatula to scrape it all out of the bowl. Spread all the apples and batter out evenly with the spatula, pressing down to make sure the apples are well compacted – you should end up with a 1 cm (1/2 inch) high cake. Smooth any additional batter over the top of the apples, then sprinkle an extra tablespoon of sugar over the cake.
Bake for 40 minutes, until the corners of the cake start to darken and caramelise. If it starts going very dark on top, you can cover the cake with foil for the last 10 minutes of baking.
Remove from the oven and leave to cool in the tin for at least 10 minutes. While cooling, sieve over a light dusting of icing sugar from a height.
Transfer to a large plate or wooden board; the ‘cake’ will be much more like a thick pancake than a traditional sponge.
Serve warm or at room temperature in slices, topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. The cake will keep for up to 3 days if stored in an airtight container in the fridge.
