Identità, always ahead

…and at one point Claudio Ceroni and Paolo Marchi start listing just a part of the old and often new projects of Identità Golose for 2017, and they basically don’t stop. Back in schooldays, they used to say you should never start an essay with “and” but Identità breaks the rules. This also happened last year, when the Guida 2016 moved entirely on the web: and it already seems like something old. New frontiers await. Yet it is (was) a new idea and so one year later, at the presentation of the 2017 edition yesterday at Magna Pars Suites in Milan, some – positive – results had to be mentioned. Marchi says: «We feel like those who one hundred years ago first transformed postal stations into petrol stations. Horses and carriages were not to disappear immediately but it was clear this was the future», that is to say «digital and happy».

Good first take, then. And the second one too, the 2017 guide whose numbers and awards editor in chief Gabriele Zanatta summed up here. And then, just to give an example of the beauty of novelties and the online, first Ceroni announced that «the restaurant reviews this year are 786, 80 more than in 2016», of which 241 around the world, in 36 countries, thanks to around one hundred collaborators worldwide. Then Zanatta corrected, from the stage: «No, they’re 785, because one (LadyBu in Milan) has just closed and we removed it». Which would be basically like contacting all those who bought a paper guide and ask them to rip off a page. Identità is more practical.

So there was a nice scene at Magna Pars, lights aside. Half of the food industry was in the audience, on stage there was the smiling face of Lisa Casali who first called Ceroni, the big chief at MagentaBureau, that is to say the entrepreneurial arm of Identità, to speak: «The choice of going digital was a big success: it looked like a pioneering decision, in fact we’ve just left the limits of paper, we’ve hugely broadened the audience and we can constantly update the content. And we restate this primacy, just like others we’ve had over the years: we were the first to present a guide of the best of the best, the first to give value to young people with constancy, which these days is very fashionable but only when they’re already important» [by the way: shortly afterwards Marchi commented: «Our task is to bet on brand new talents. So we often recommend places long before others do»].

And here’s the announced list of events in 2017, which we’ll sum up for the sake of brevity: «We’ve just celebrated our usual collaboration with Opera San Francesco, but we have other charity projects in mind, a growing commitment for us: on 27th November there will be Aggiungi un posto a tavola, a project with Centro Clinico Nemo to fight neuromuscular diseases. Storie di gusto e di passione, with Coincasa and Cargo etc., with whom we’ve travelled around Italy with great chefs, has just ended. Of course there will also be Premio Birra Moretti Grand Cru, edition 2016 ended on 7th November with the usual valorisation of young chefs. 2017 will also be characterised by our support to East Lombardy, a project we partnered with because it’s innovative».

There will be the usual congress events: in Milan, of course, on 4-6th March (we’ll return to that). Identità Future, the format within Host that allows giving a look to new technologies in the kitchen in October. Abroad there will be Identità Chicago and Identità New York, plus the first Identità Boston. There will be a new collaboration with The Fork, the big booking website, «which will allow us – says again Ceroni – to extend the experience of Le Tavole di Identità Golose nationally».

The list could continue but it’s time to give the word to Paolo Marchi. With a little nostalgia: «Tenth edition of the Guide, we’ve awarded many people», and on the screen the faces of Redzepi and Palmieri, Sultano and the Costardi brothers, Crippa and Alija, Aliberti and Pisani-Negrini, Varese and Romito(«At the time they didn’t even have a star»), Lopriore and Tokuyoshi, Bartolini and Klugmann, appear. Marchi stops to give word to representatives of the institutions, in this case the Agriculture Assessor of Lombardy, Gianni Fava: «Milan with Identità Golose is the Italian capital of taste, this is why we’ll partner with the congress in Milan. We’re the largest region in Europe in the food industry, we produce excellences, hence we’re happy that Identità Milano gives them a voice and puts them in contact with great chefs» On stage Zanatta reminds that this year Storie di Gola, the stories for the palate, are all signed by female authors: Milan by Sandra Ciciriello and Viviana Varese, East Lombardy by Annalisa Cavaleri, Lucca by Anna Morelli, Rome by Laura Mantovano, Naples by Barbara Guerra, Bari by Sonia Gioia, Paris by Alessandra Pierini, London by Luciana Bianchi, Tel Aviv by Fabiana Magrì, Kiev by Marina Mayevska, Chicago by Sarah Grueneberg, San Francisco by Camilla Baresani, Lima by Sara Porro and Manila by Margarita Forés.

The customary photo, then Marchi is back and starts the series of awards (see the photo gallery by Francesca Brambilla and Serena Serrani) and then Giorgio Gori, mayor of Bergamo, and professor Roberta Garibaldi get onstage to explain East Lombardy, «a huge team work: 10 project partners, 80 stakeholders, over 200 professionals who have already joined. We have a network of great restaurants that will become ambassadors of East Lombardy and its products all over Europe». With an essential goal: integrating the tourism offer with the food and wine one, and promoting sensitivity. They handed the Best food writer award to Ryan King.

Final suspense to find out more about the congress in March. Marchi stops the delay: «The theme will be The Strength of Freedom, like last year, but with an additional element: The Journey. After all, cooking is a sum of travels, of exchanges». The dish emblem of the congress will by Bordeaux by Enrico Crippa, a beautiful prawn cocktail with late radicchio. On top of the auditorium, in the side rooms there will be Identità di Formaggio, Identità di Gelato, Identità Naturali, Identità di Pane e Pizza, Identità di Pasta, Identità di Champagne (second edition) and a novelty: «It’s very important to me – ends Marchi – on 5th March we’ll give space to 12 new faces in our cuisine (some he awarded right before, such as Luca Abbruzzino and Floriano and Giovanni Pellegrino, plus 10 more), with the debut of the “Nuova cucina italiana” section»). Always ahead.