Ilario Vinciguerra

On July 2010 Ilario Vinciguerra will celebrate the tenth year pent-up in the little kitchen of Antica Trattoria Monte Costone, a restaurant that few months ago turned his name into that of the chef himself.

Metaphorically, it is as if this decade had given birth to a strong, firm and stable identity. But note: to tell it all, decades Ilario has been working for are two, as he stepped in the first one from France to Belgium, Switzerland and both Sant'Agata sui Due Golfi and Japan courts with the Iaccarino family. Twenty years out of 35, well over half of his life, have passed to deserve a star, a stable place into Jre association, teaching staff of Alma school, and a pretty important award for the best olive-oil-based dish, received from Lo Mejor de la Gastronomia in San Sebastian, 2007. "Profumo” was a tartare made with red Sicilian shrimps in a sphere of plexiglass, olive oil, edible flowers and two gels, one made of squid ink, the other with lemons from Sorrento. Here lies unveiled the birthplace of our chef, then: Naples and the Mediterranean, two distant horizons that do not cease to appear daily in front of him through the shapes of San Marzano tomatoes, Gerardo Di Nola eliche and paccheri pasta, pastiere and ciccioli. Of course, he does not stand there passively overwhelmed by smells and tastes. Indeed, he straightens them with the logic of essentiality and recognition of each ingredients. And with a pondered creativity that, under the sphere of Profumo itslef tells him to poor a few drops of gin and tonic to balance the chance.

Be aware that his conducting style is very personal: it travels on tracks other than those forked every day by Gennaro Esposito and Tonino Cannavacciuolo, friends and colleagues that people often tend to include in a trio with Ilario. How a cook from Naples can cook happily between the storms and fogs of Galliate Lombardo, is well explained by the presence in the dining hall of Marika, his Varese-born new bride and muse.