Spaghetti with Meatballs, Chicken Cacciatora, Shrimp Scampi… they all evoke red and white-checked tablecloths, candles in Chianti bottles, and Dean Martin on the jukebox. However, not one of these dishes is truly Italian.

The first edition of Skip Lombardi's cookbook, Almost Italian, captured the hearts of Italian Americans with kitchen anecdotes and recipes gathered from scores of Little Italy communities. Currently unfolding on the World Wide Web, his greatly expanded and illustrated second edition of Almost Italian is making readers hungrier than ever as they wait for the next installment.

Now, anyone with Internet access can read Almost Italian (2nd Edition) online. Installments began September 19, 2007 and will continue until the entire book has been posted. Access to the online edition is free of charge.

Lombardi celebrates the spirit of Italians who arrived in America during the huge waves of European immigration in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Rich culinary traditions accompanied even the poorest Italian immigrants who settled here and found a gastronomic landscape of both limitation and opportunity.

Initially, some of the ingredients essential to their cooking -- olive oil, sheep's milk cheeses, and even pasta -- were unavailable. But at the same time, the new immigrants were amazed to discover they could afford other ingredients that, in the old country, had been out of their financial reach -- most notably, larger quantities of meat and chicken. Both lack -- and abundance -- inspired an entirely new cuisine: what we have come to know as Italian American.

The earlier edition of Almost Italian was a collection of 87 recipes. Though indisputably Italian American, most of the dishes were virtually unknown in Italy. But times (and food) have changed. Some dishes of American invention have begun appearing on trattoria menus in Italy. Italian American cuisine itself is constantly evolving as more of us travel to Italy and come back with our own notions of what's Italian. Once-exotic imports sold only by specialty grocers in urban Little Italys are now supermarket staples in towns across America. And thanks to advances in Internet technology, those who produce, sell, cook or simply enjoy Italian ingredients can converse and interact as never before. The network for food research and sharing the pleasures of the table has grown exponentially.

"More than ever, the medium is the message," declares Mr. Lombardi, "so my editor and I thought: why not serialize the second edition of Almost Italian as an online blog?"

"The recipes will range from antipasti to dolci. For me, the stories behind many old favorites -- dishes like Caesar Salad, Clams Casino, Cioppino, Lobster Fra Diavolo, Stromboli, and Veal Parmesan -- are as delicious as the preparations themselves, and I can't wait to share them. So, I encourage readers to subscribe to my RSS feed or bookmark the blog and check in often to enjoy each update as soon as it is posted.

As I move along with the project, I'm soliciting my readers' participation. Because the culinary history of Italians in America truly belongs to all of us, I'm asking readers -- Italian or not -- to e-mail me stories, old photos, recipes, menus -- anything they want to share. For any material I choose to post on the blog, I'll be delighted to include a credit and a link back to the contributor. The second edition of Almost Italian will reflect the fact that the Internet makes it easier than ever to be part of a community."

Skip Lombardi, a professional musician, food writer and chef, grew up in an extended Sicilian-American family in which his maternal grandparents carried on the food traditions of Sicily -- baking bread, curing olives, and tending their backyard grape arbor. But his real exploration of food began when he had yet another career, as a software designer, and moved to what he calls "Boston's Red Sauce District," the city's historic, Italian North End.

Mr. Lombardi says, "During my 25 years working in the software industry, I had the privilege of living not only in Boston, but in a neighborhood where the scent of gently frying garlic made me appreciate that I was just where I was supposed to be.

Though I miss the North End, I think of the Web as the perfect kitchen in which to combine my experiences in programming with my affinities for prosciutto, pasta, and pecorino Romano.

I know this second edition of Almost Italian will be a different and far more engaging book than the one published just three years ago. My fundamental belief that there is no situation that can't be improved by a plate of pasta with a little of Nonna's marinara sauce, remains unshaken.

I look forward to sharing my passion for food with a new audience and, especially, with everyone who enjoyed the first edition of Almost Italian."

For a sneak preview, visit http://almostitalian.com to read just the sort of recipe you can look forward to in the weeks ahead.