15-06-2018
Ferran Adrià celebrated at the castle in Grinzane Cavour; to his left, Terry Giacomello. He’s the current chef at restaurant Inkiostro in Parma, and spent 4 years at elBulli in Rosas, the famous restaurant of the Catalan chef
A total of 24 hours and not one minute wasted for Ferran Adrià. On Saturday 9th of June in Torino there was the opening to the press of Condividere, the restaurant created inside the Nuvola Lavazza and handed to Federico Zanasi, as Carlo Passera told us here. On Sunday, the tribute given to the Catalan genius by Langhe, Roero and Monferrato at the castle of Grinzane Cavour. This as part of Dialoghi del gusto nei paesaggi Unesco.
As soon as Ferran got his fourth portion of Agnolotti del plin alla curdunà made by Piera Ciriofrom Madonna della Neve in Cessole, he said his goodbyes. And off to the airport in Caselle, after explaining that those minuscule ravioli served without sauce on a napkin, called curdunà, perfectly showed how culinary art prevailed over French centennial fine dining.
The lovely Agnolotti del plin alla curdunà served during the lunch in honour of Ferran Adrià on Sunday 10th June at the castle of Grinzane Cavour
Souvenir photo, and lots of cheering for the people who designed the lunch in honour of Ferran Adrià on Sunday 10th June. Left to right: Marc Lanteri, resident chef at the castle of Grinzane Cavour, Francesca Cirio, 82, cook at restaurant Madonna della Neve in Cessole, whom everyone calls Piera. And finally her son Piermassimo Cirio
Even the chef from Emilia takes this seriously: «I was struck by one fact above all: Ferran asks you the reason behind every ingredient, pairing, and step. He asks the logic behind every choice. There’s no space for elusiveness». Yet this is the future of this new establishment. At the castle in Grinzane, the Catalan recalled plenty of memories, a sort of pilgrimage that started in 1995 with people like Carlo Petrini, Giorgio Grigliati, Bob Noto who before going to heaven recommended Zanasi as the best chef for the Condividereproject. And then there’s Stefano Bonilli who «in 1997 organised a trip for 25 cooks to Cala Montijoi and then put me on the cover of a famous issue by Gambero Rosso, holding a syphon. My first cover abroad».
The dining room at Condividere, the restaurant created by Lavazza in their new headquarters in Torino
At Cala Montijoi everything was new: «Every year, completely new dishes. No other place, even these days, does something like this in the space of 12 months. We’ve counted 1846 dishes, and so, in 2019 in the same place we’ll haveElBulli1846, a restaurant non-restaurant, plus the foundation and a centre for research on innovation, plus Barcelona, plus the encyclopaedia made of 65 books of 600 pages. We closed elBulli because we had explored every boundary and needed to widen our horizon».
Sunset on the hills of the Langhe
There would be so many more things to say, what with yesterday’s elBulli and the one to come.
Translated into English by Slawka G. Scarso
A mouth watering page, published every Sunday in Il Giornale from November 1999 to the autumn of 2010. Stories and personalities that continue to live in this website
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born in Milan in March 1955, at Il Giornale for 31 years dividing himself between sports and food, since 2004 he's the creator and curator of Identità Golose. blog www.paolomarchi.it instagram instagram.com/oloapmarchi