27-05-2014

The Mat Festival: a good start

Discovering Swedish flavours thanks to the food event created by Mattias Kroon

Barbara Guerra and Albert Sapere, curators of Le S

Barbara Guerra and Albert Sapere, curators of Le Strade della Mozzarella, take us on a trip to Southern Sweden. Their destination is the Mat Festival (literally "food festival") in Skanör and Falsterbo, an event created by Mattias Kroon, awarded, this year, as "best journalist" according to Identità Golose 2014

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Le vacche "hippie"
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Le vacche

Tareq Taylor, star-chef televisivo

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Le vacche

Street food napoletano di Peppe Daddio

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Le vacche

Un'altro piatto di Peppe Daddio

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Le vacche

I ragazzi del Nordic Food Lab in relax

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Le vacche

Il Garum di cavallette

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Le vacche

Degustazione di Mozzarella di Bufala Campana DOP

From May 16th till the 18th the small peninsula in which twin villages Skanör and Falsterbo are set, was the location of the first edition of the food festival created by Mattias Kroon. This is one of the most popular and appreciated Swedish tourist destinations, with a sandy beach, water that is not too deep, golf courses, fishing and game activities, good restaurants. The countryside colours are brilliant: the green and the yellow of the fields with rapeseeds, the blue in the sky filled with sun.

The view of the sea is marked by the flowing line of the Øresund bridge, an imposing engineering work that links Denmark to Sweden and was opened in 2000 – time references, over here, are based on before and after the opening of the bridge. Mattias, Swedish journalist awarded in the latest edition of the Guida di Identità Golose ai ristoranti di Italia, Europa e Mondo, developed the idea of organising an event in his place of birth that would draw attention to its food specialties.

Food trucks, concentrated in the port of the small Swedish peninsula, are among the attractions of the Mat Festival

Food trucks, concentrated in the port of the small Swedish peninsula, are among the attractions of the Mat Festival

We discover a sea rich in large and meaty garfish that have little consideration in the local diet in which white fish and salmon fillets triumph. There are attempts to make people aware of the consumption of wild meat such as the boars that live in the woods surrounding the two villages, caught following strict regulations, or “hippiecows, of the Highland breed, full of hairs and freely and numerously populating the moors. Their only use is to keep the environment clean.

The attention is also focused on asparagus, berries, rhubarb and seasonal vegetables. The leitmotif is a natural, true and sustainable diet. A journey that tries to get closer to a new and aware concept of food offered to the audience, made of fanatics, enthusiasts and simple tourists, spontaneously and informally. The Mat Festival is organised in a casual and fun way, one can sense the energy and the enthusiasm walking around each place involved in the event: the port with its food trucks, the market with local specialties, the eight restaurants in which one can find as many famous chefs. When walking, we bump into the guys from Noma’s Nordic Food Lab in Copenhagen after their presentation dedicated to grasshopper garum.

How could one say no to the Festival’s official beer?

How could one say no to the Festival’s official beer?

We follow the aroma coming from the garden of a small hotel where a very popular chef and television guru, Tareq Taylor, is explaining natural food and cooking by preparing a barbeque with local ingredients. People move around on bicycle, on foot or on horse. Meanwhile, on the beach, a boar is being cooked in a large hole, together with the vegetables that will be used for the final feast. Aldo Castiglione and wife Annika open the doors of their Italian restaurant Da Aldo – their espresso coffee is highly recommended – to the most evocative gastronomic districts in Italy, that of Mozzarella di Bufala Campana DOP, Vesuvius and San Marzano tomatoes, extra virgin olive oil, Pasta di Gragnano and Pizza.

All the themed tastings, organised together with chef Peppe Daddio were sold out. Almost at the end, chef Daniel Berlin, already known as a speaker during Identità Golose offers his menu, in collaboration with a local restaurant. The festival ends around a coarse wood table lavishly laid with the boar cooked under the sand and the not to be missed Mat Festival beer: it’s ten at night, dusk endures and the natural light is enough to light up the satisfied faces of Mattias and his chef and restaurateur friends. The first step of this concrete project full of ambition is taken.

Photogallery
Le vacche "hippie"
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Le vacche

Tareq Taylor, star-chef televisivo

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Le vacche

Street food napoletano di Peppe Daddio

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Le vacche

Un'altro piatto di Peppe Daddio

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Le vacche

I ragazzi del Nordic Food Lab in relax

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Le vacche

Il Garum di cavallette

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Le vacche

Degustazione di Mozzarella di Bufala Campana DOP


Dal Mondo

Reviews, recommendations and trends from the four corners of the planet, signed by all the authors of Identità Golose

by

Barbara Guerra and Albert Sapere