When you mention one hundred people or things, you always tend to forget someone. And then that someone is upset, and rightly so. So you often end up being generic. Thinking back to Identità first in Chicago and then in New York, the list is long and goes beyond the official duration, on 1st and 2nd October in Windy City, on 4-6th October in Manhattan. Indeed a great pizza night with Franco Pepe prolonged the trip by 24 hours. It was held in the new Downtown store owned by the Farinetti family, the Saper brothers, Mario Batali and Lidia and Joe Bastianich, right where the Twin Towers stood before they were torn down on 9/11.
So last Saturday I found myself once again at Eataly Flatiron, an ice cream, a coffee, a moment of relax and who comes in, acting as nobody? Magnus Nilsson, Swedish chef at Faviken, a restaurant close to the Artic Circle. An unexpected surprise, just like Peruvian Virgilio Martinez two days earlier: «Hi Magnus, are you here to present your new book? No, I’m on holiday». See, if a Swede relaxing with his partner feels like stopping by at Eataly when in a town as huge and thrilling as New York it must mean that high quality Italian food, embodied by Eataly too, is winning. An example for everyone, not just Italians.
The protagonists of the lunch at Eataly Chicago. Left to right, Federico Kauss, Alessandro Pesci, Michael Tusk, Giancarlo Perbellini, Lidia Bastianich, Carlo Cracco
Between Chicago and New York there were many happy moments, starting from a surprising
Sarah Grueneberg with pasta, who opened less than one year ago a place of her own in Chicago,
Monteverde. Two extraordinary dishes by
Michael Tusk, during the demo and at lunchtime on Sunday 2nd October, counterpointing the always-high standards of
Carlo Cracco and
Giancarlo Perbellini. The endless energy of the always-present Lidia Bastianich, not a moment of tiredness, who made a perfect pair with Franco Pepe who was truly thrilled to bring his pizzas to the other side of the ocean. The bright eyes of vegan and raw diet chef
Matthew Kenney, who was ready to embrace fire to open his pizzeria in Manhattan, pairing his delicious cold food, with his pizzas without any ingredient of animal origin – especially mozzarella – and un unexpected wine list.
Five lessons (and ten protagonists) between Chicago and New York: the classrooms were always packed
, regardless of the context in which it expresses itself, always tries to highlight the best and the new, to avoid easy choices that often risk to lead to banality. And the speakers were very careful to second the questions, to answer why they added a particular touch, during the lessons and the final dinner, on Thursday 6th, which
Franco Pepe doubled together with
Riccardo Orfino at
Osteria della Pace at Eataly Downtown on Friday. We moved from an incredible
Dine Around dinner at the restaurants in the first
Eataly in Madison Square Park to a dinner named
Pizza Takeover, celebrating the flavors of Campania, with the ex minister for agricultural policies
Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio who is currently fighting so that Neapolitan pizza can be acknowledged by Unesco.
The Cream Doughnut by Niko Romito, the last dish in the Dine Around dinner on Friday 6th October at Eataly Flatiron
The itinerating dinner released lots of energy and spread many ideas. Six chef and six stops in six different restaurants for six groups of 50 people each, a total of 300. It started at 17.30, while the last shift was at 00.30. First
Kenney and his vegan universe; then
Massimo Bottura and the Lentils better than caviar; while
Franco Pepe’s
Sensazioni di Costiera anticipated
Fortunato Nicotra’s Conchiglie Nere. After the pasta restaurant, off to
Manzo, the meat restaurant, for brisket, beef breast prepared by
Alex Atala, always fascinating in his evoking the Amazon. Finally the dessert, the
Bomba alla crema [Cream doughnut] thanks to which
Niko Romito conquered everyone’s heart.
All the articles on Chicago and New York
Talent and mentorship, the S.Pellegrino round table
Niko Romito and Matthew Kenney’s lesson
Massimo Bottura and Alex Atala’s lesson
Morning at Eataly Downtown
Franco Pepe and Lidia Bastianich’s lesson
Carlo Cracco and Michael Tusk’s lesson
Giancarlo Perbellini and Sarah Grueneberg’s lesson
