Puglia native Anna Maggio believes eating is one of life’s greatest pleasures, and that simple dishes are the ones we should relish. "When someone has done something with a few fresh ingredients and it tastes good, that’s a victory,” she says. And those victories are a way of life in her homeland.

Her beautiful new book, Under the Olive Tree: Memories and Flavours of Puglia, celebrates the rustic cuisine of this region of southern Italy, the heel of the Italian boot, where she grew up in a small village. At age 10, her family moved to Milan.