Tomatoes are an integral part of Italian cuisine (used in pasta, lasagna, bruschetta, etc. etc.), but tomatoes are a new world food. What was Italian cuisine like before the introduction of the tomato, how quickly was it adopted, and when did what we consider to be modern Italian cuisine emerge?

You may also be interested in this quote regarding a 16th century Italian chef:

"I made him give an account of his responsibilities. He gave me a discourse on this science of supping with grave and magisterial countenance, as if he were speaking of some grand point of theology. He unravelled differences in appetite for me: the appetite one has at the outset, and that which one has after the second and third courses; the means of sometimes appealing to it in simple ways, sometimes reawakening and stimulating it; the rules regarding sauces, first in general and then particularising the qualities of ingredients and their effects; the different salads according to their season, what must be served hot and what cold, and the ways of decorating and embellishing them to make them even more pleasing in appearance. After that, he embarked on the order of courses, full of important and fine considerations…. And all this bloated with grand and magnificent words, such as one might use in describing the government of an empire."

(Montaigne, 1595b: Book 1, Essay 51)

If that attitude looks familiar you find it in French haute cuisine of the late 17th early 18th century. A lot of culinary history swings between the 'simple fresh food served simply' and 'food that shows off the skill of the chef through complex pairings of flavours'. Both concepts are usually active in a region and time-period a the same time but one will be considered 'better' than the other.