Marco Reitano
Dumplings with squill-fishes, artichokes and sweet potatoby Moreno Cedroni
Dall'Italia Vito Mollica: «Non mi interessa solo il piatto, ma come la ristorazione può cambiare una città»
Casunziei with butter and poppy seeds, the signature dish of Cortina d'Ampezzo in the delicious interpretation of Riccardo Gaspari, chef and patron at SanBrite with his wife Ludovica Rubbini
On Tuesday 9th of February, Capolavori italiani in cucina stopped in Cortina d'Ampezzo, which since last Sunday is hosting, for two weeks, the World Ski Championships. The choice of date was not a coincidence. This way Riccardo Gaspari presented at Striscia la Notizia the emblem dish of an Alpine town that hosted the Olympics already in 1956 and will do so again in 2026. Thanks to the chef from SanBrite many viewers discovered casunziei whose name recalls casoncelli, the typical pasta of Bergamo and Brescia, though the comparison ends there. While the pasta from Lombardy is filled with meat, the one from Cortina is vegetarian.
Ernesto Iaccarino, featured in the first episode of Capolavori italiani in cucina, on the 3rd December 2019 within Striscia la Notizia
Viviana Varese's take on Fried pizza
Pizza viola from the Aloe brothers at Berberè
With Gaspari and his casunziei it will be a debut for Veneto. It's surprising, since it's on the border with Lombardy, but what with the pandemic and the bans, this was the first opportunity. And we still need to cover Friuli, Romagna, Umbria, Molise, Basilicata, Sardinia and Calabria. I hope time will be on our side.
As for the dishes, the abundance of pasta comes as no surprise: nineteen dishes. In Italy we love carbohydrates, we can't do without. If we add risotto, five recipes, half of the episodes feature a first course.
A nice screenshot from the episode of Striscia that featured Carlo Cracco and Alain Ducasse
And then there are three pizzas, an ice cream, a salad, the one deserving to be framed, from Enrico Crippa at Piazza Duomo in Alba, only three fish recipes and three starters, Insalata russa caramellata from Carlo Cracco and torta pasqualina from Marco Visciola at Eataly Genova. Meat was featured eight times, and so was with cakes.
Finally, two chefs appeared twice: the Cerea brothers, Chicco and Bobo, first charmed with their Double cutlet, then finished the 2019/20 season at the end of June with their cannoncini which they brought to the hosts of the TV programme, Michele Hunziker and Gerry Scotti.
Cesare Battisti instead, in mid-February, revealed every step of Saffron risotto with bone marrow, and then early in May he launched a not very mouth-watering alarm on the crisis that has hit restaurants, which have fallen at the end of a precipice and were left there by Conte's government.
One thing is certain: there are so many masterpieces in Italian cuisine, without even considering the most creative recipes, that I will never overcome my embarrassment for not knowing which one to pick next. For anyone that is recorded, there are ten that I'm forced to ignore.
Translated into English by Slawka G. Scarso
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. twitter @oloapmarchi