The Venetian master, the Lombard pupil, and Ligurian cuisine. Carlo Cracco and Mattia Pecis: great dishes in Portofino

Carlo Cracco and his Cracco Portofino, the former legendary Pitosforo

Pecis in front of the fish maturation cell, 'we don't push very hard with maturation, just a couple of days to soften the meat'.

From the Instagram page of Cracco Portofino: "This is Iva, who looks after our vegetable garden in Rapallo. She and her husband Alberto have dedicated their lives to nature for 40 years, cultivating with passion and devotion every single product that grows, in a totally sustainable way, on their land. Three times a week she arrives with her flaming red Ape, with a load of delicacies".

Pecis with Adriano, the supplier of the Santa Magherita red prawns, and his son

The very young brigade of Cracco Portofino: left to right David Rottigni, Fabio Bonanata, Ishak Moussa, executive Mattia Pecis, Mina Karimi, Matteo Nuncerin, Teseo Alloni, Francesco Bosi, Alessandro Polli. Photo Tanio Liotta

Cappon magro del Molo Umberto I: worth the trip alone. Photo Tanio Liotta

Mini-piadina with smoked paprika swordfish speck and kefir crème fraîche, delicious

Buckwheat tartlet with ricotta, grouper liver, flowers and herbs

Caramelized 'Portofino' Russian salad: Carlo Cracco's legendary caramelized Russian salad in a Ligurian version, with basil mayonnaise, potatoes and French beans

Corzetto with marinated egg yolk: Here again, one of Carlo Cracco's now anthological dishes, marinated egg yolk, merges with a Ligurian tradition, that of corzetti, a typical pasta (the so-called 'printed' pasta - corzétti stanpæ or corzetti del Levante - thus called because, as in this case, the decoration of these small, medallion-shaped circles of pasta is made with a wooden mould, which in this case bears Cracco's logo) and encloses a cream with marjoram, pine nuts and small inflorescences. It is the one occasion in the whole menu when in our opinion he pushes a little too hard, losing elegance

Seasalad: cuttlefish processed with ultrasound (to soften the fibres) and then cooked at low temperature. Served with chopped tomatoes, fig oil and roasted almond cream

Adriano's shrimp, a dish dedicated to the fisherman who supplies Cracco Portofino with shrimp: purple shrimp from Santa Margherita, raw, covered with watermelon carpaccio marinated in gin made by Cracco himself, you can buy it here. Then two carapace mayos: the pinker one with the heads of the prawn, the other one with the barbequed tails. Then cucumber and cucamelon sauce, something in between watermelon and cucumber. Delicious

The anchovy: anchovies marinated for 40 days in barrels under salt ('We learnt the method from a man from Monterosso'), accompanied by parsley oil and tomatoes confit. On the side, pan brioche to scoop the sauce

Il cappon magro del Molo Umberto I: an extraordinary, truly ingenious dish, which reinvents the cappon magro, a classic of Ligurian cuisine, and lightens it, balances it, and makes it very refined. Hake base, then green sauce, mussels, scampi, prawns, galletta del marinaio. Simple? Superb

Risotto with prebuggiun, red mullet lacquered in double-malt beer and prescinseua sauce, with grains of red mullet bones. "We didn't want to serve a predictable rice, so we went in search of ideas and met this woman, Lella Canepa (lellacanepa.com), who picks the 22 herbs necessary for a true prebuggiun, ranging from bitter, to sweet, to sour. When mixed well, they give a unique taste'. Here they are blended to obtain a cream in which the rice is mixed. On top, the sour prescinseua sauce, that is the cheese once used for the focaccia di Recco, 'nowadays it is not used as much because people don't like sour flavours. For us, Signora Iva prepares it at home, she also looks after our vegetable garden'. Many flavours, many aromas: an important, courageous, excellent dish

Good risotto? This pasta is exceptional: Spaghettone Monograno Felicetti with black cherry extract, raw Santa Margherita langoustine, bottarga, basil oil and smoked provola sauce. Incredible balance of flavours

Fish R-Amen: i.e. a classic ramen transformed into a seafood version, with tuna belly replacing pork belly, a very concentrated fish broth, then noodles, herb oils (wild garlic, wild onion, borage...) and 'soaked' seafood. Very good, but a step below the previous dishes

Chargrilled amberjack collar and herbs, chargrilled carrot, blueberry miso, porcini sauce and lemon thyme. "We serve this part of the fish to make it better known and also because it is extraordinarily good", it is left to mature for two days in the ripening room to soften its meat

Something arrives, baked in a clay crust

The dish is called L'orto di Iva (Iva's vegetable garden). It changes depending on what Mrs Iva brings from the garden 'where 90% of our vegetables come from'. In this case, under the clay crust there is leek, first sautéed on charcoal and then wrapped in fig leaves, before cooking, retaining all its moisture. The sauce is vegetal, reduced, made only with oven-roasted vegetables, and accompanied by fermented currants to give acidity and counteract the jus’s tendency towards sweetness

Breaded monkfish liver, burnt leek mayonnaise, salad maison (pictured below)

Fermented peach tatin, rosewater sorbet