Comment: Just how many porcini can you eat?

HAD A wonderful time in Tuscany and Umbria, since you ask. And not all my pleasure came out of knowing that, at last, I was up there with the chatterati and, of course, the Blairs, who were staying but a butterfly's flight away.

I loved the landscapes, the layers and layers of history and art (though I will not be seeking out any paintings of the Madonna and Child for a while) and the endlessly charming people, particularly Francesco, our landlord, who looked like Kevin Costner, especially when he threw off his shirt and walked around slowly fishing out wasps from the swimming- pool. But, truth to tell, unlike all those other devotees of the region I found the food monotonous and ridiculously over-praised.

Just how many porcini mushrooms and tomatoes can you eat? And can we please agree that, unless it's drowning in good vinegar, mozzarella is the blandest cheese in the whole world?

Yes, northern Italian food is healthy and, when cooked well, tasty enough. But it does not merit the awe and reverence with which it is regarded by Italians and by upper-middle-class Brits. Together they have created an inflated reputation that does need to be debunked, however much the River Cafe foodies will rage.

In our local bookshop, I counted 47 Italian recipe books. It was, by far, the biggest category. Most of them read like books of religious revelation. Olive oil is the preferred drink of the angels, sings one, as it goes on for four pages about the properties of this holy sap. Our own sensible Delia quite loses her head in her summer collection, proclaiming that "good bread dipped into fruity olive oil and tomato juices is the food of the gods". Another writer devotes 40 pages to pasta. Thirty of those have sauces where the ingredients are primarily tomatoes, olive oil and garlic.

In a restaurant in Florence we ordered antipasto that was described, in English, as "the fantasia of perfect crostini and bruschetta to make the tears of pleasure". A very lovely, hand-painted platter (with angels, as it happens) arrived with tomato, olives, anchovies, mushrooms and cheese on toast. Our only tears were of rage at the prices we were charged for a plate of toast and bits. Another Tuscan dish that is hailed as definitive is bistecca alla Fiorentina. It is nothing more than a T-bone steak, which I have had better cooked in Texas where they at least add some piquant marinades to the meat.

We did have some exceptional culinary moments. Some small Tuscan restaurants, which were more earthy than heavenly, served excellent pigeon and other gamebirds. But on the whole, for a Londoner accustomed to great culinary variety, Tuscan and Umbrian food failed to impress, partly because it is so determinedly self-contained.

Even the French are more adventurous. At least they have taken to Vietnamese food. When I used to teach English as a foreign language, many of my students lodged with us. It was only the Italians who would not even try food that was not Italian. The effervescent Antonio Carluccio, in his best-selling Italian Feast, says without blushing that he has yet to find "ethnic" cooking that is as good as Italian cooking. Instead of dismissing such culinary arrogance and bigotry, the British have for decades (since Elizabeth David, in fact) fallen over themselves to encourage these myths.

Perhaps I miss the point. Perhaps the attraction of Italian food is precisely that it is predictable and that it symbolises historical continuity, a kind of peace and simplicity. I can see how this might appeal to our metropolitan elite, whose lives in this country are now inescapably complex, diverse and ever in a state of flux. For a while they can feel connected to their old European ancestry and rural myths. No multicultural contamination here. No foreign bits that your grandmother would not have known.

This concentration on the old and abiding has other problems. It blinds visitors to other impressive aspects of Italian life that are to do with how the country is today. Municipal socialism in Umbria, for example, really works. It has given this once run-down area, which had a record number of emigrants (many of whom have returned), a sense of common purpose and confidence that is enviable. There is little evidence of what has become common in most parts of the world, the bloatedly rich towering over the eternally poor.

I love the way Italian families work, and the cross-generational respect that lies at the heart of their society. All this and more will compel me to return to that country. But not without my chillies, maybe some popadums, long-life methi parathas and home-made mango achars (or even Branston pickle).