Emiko Davies

There are thousands of cooking blogs -- each week, we bring you highlights from the best. This week, a romp through Tuscany.

As we sifted through the entries to last week's dumpling contest, we came across a fresh face on food52: Emiko Davies, whose photographs we want to pull off our screens and paste on our walls. Who is this worldy Japanese-Australian cook gone Italian expat, who grew up in China and now produces a beautiful travel, food, life blog that has us all ready to hop a plane to Rome?

If Edith Wharton or Elizabeth David had snapped digital photos and blogged their experiences, they may have produced something similar to this italophilic site. "I've been been a traveler for as long as I can remember," Davies writes. A resident of Florence for the past six years, where she moved to marry a Tuscan, Emiko Davies documents rustic Italian life in all its human, delicious, and scenic glory. From fields of vines primed for harvest to swordfish deboned to honey drizzling on (perhaps) granola to Bryant Park in NYC to bridges over the Arno, all we can think is: andiamo (let's go!). See for yourself, in her travel gallery here (don't say we didn't warn you).

And still, the quality of her written content shines through: "My little world is mostly based in and around Florence, where the favourite local dishes are still what they were generations ago," Davies writes of her Tuscan Food Blog (the stream of story, recipe and travel diary on the site). "Things don’t change much but the beauty of that is that the dishes have plenty of stories to tell." No doubt Davies takes her cultural entrenchment seriously -- the monthly featured recipe from Artusi, the beloved grandfather of Italian cookbooks, is testament to the reverence she has for Italian food. 

Embedded in her travel writing are recipes that will assuredly transport you there: Carrot Gnocchi, Plum wine Tiramisu masquerading as a Pavlova, Agnolotti with Shaved Black Truffle, Fava Bean Crostini (aka spring on a plate) -- four words for you, Emiko: take us with you.