Dear {NOMEUTENTE}
I must say that Riccardo Felicetti read my mind and so I urge you to read what he has written in the next news carefully. I can add one thing, when there’s a week to go until the fifth edition of Identità di Pasta: I wasn’t expecting such a success. Let me explain: Italy is full of people who think they know it all, certainties that arise from ignorance and presumption, people who are born with all the knowledge and have never had any doubt or curiosity to go beyond what they know.
Identità di Pasta, instead, has demonstrated that there are many people who want to be informed and are never satisfied with what they have learnt. While risotto and rice belong more to Northern Italy than to the Centre and the South, and pizza has a world of its own, even though much is changing, pasta joins all the regions, both at home and in the restaurant.
Paolo Marchi, texts by Gabriele Zanatta |
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Felicetti, a revolution in five editions  I would like to express all the satisfaction (and let me say also the joy) for having reached the goal of the fifth edition of Identità di pasta, a format that, from Elio Sironi, the first to get on stage (see photo), to Alessandro Gilmozzi, the last speaker in last year’s edition, has already seen 32 protagonists exploring the borders of dried pasta.
Counting next Sunday, the total will reach 40 and my mind necessarily goes back to the beginning of this adventure, when we decided to develop this theme, together with Paolo Marchi, and dried pasta was so finely barricaded behind tradition. Few people at the time dared to come out of that barricade and were pointed at like aliens, their dishes considered as eyewash. During these last four years it has gained more and more space and the evolution of research and creativity with regards to dried pasta has spread out with the authentic awareness that few other products can give so many gastronomic guarantees.
For this reason I’m extremely happy to read a great chef as Mauro Uliassi (see below, Editor’s note) say that durum wheat pasta is the most stimulating to use. Or that Enrico Bartolini (further below) over the last few years has often changed idea, giving value to a product he previously didn’t believe would be able to satisfy his artisanal approach. If dried pasta has arrived where it has now, it is thanks to you. So thank you and enjoy Identità di pasta number 5.
Riccardo Felicetti |
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Uliassi, secretary of the dried pasta party  «I have always been in favour of dried pasta because it is more complicated and thus more stimulating to use. In the case of cappelletti, you throw them into the water and then pick them, they never overcook and have a very short cooking time; with spaghetti, if you keep them in the water a few seconds over what is allowed, you’re finished. It’s also more fascinating to season, because spaghetti never travel alone, but in fact, more than any other ingredient, they convey Italian culture through the condiment you choose». So it is right that Mauro Uliassi from Senigallia will be the one to open the fifth edition of Identità di pasta, on Tuesday February 11th in Sala Blu 1, at 10.15 with a lecture that will analyse the relationship between “Adriatic sea and durum wheat pasta”.
The reason why durum wheat itself has successfully crossed the borders of our country is because «it is nutritious, easy to stock, has very low costs and can be preserved with no problems. It has lots of qualities and therefore it can be made global: by using the right raw materials you can prepare a good pasta recipe even in the heart of Africa». In Italy, Uliassi’s Smoked spaghetti with clams is a classic already. However, this doesn’t mean that on the Adriatic sea pasta should always be served in its long format: «I don’t have a favourite variety», he adds, «short pasta, for instance, is the safest choice when you need to dish out plates for hundreds of people. In that case, using spaghetti is a mess».
And what will happen in Milan? «We will bring three dishes: Pasta, potato and mussels soup; Mezzi rigatoni with black truffle, anchovies, broccoli and raw ciauscolo and Fusilli with squid liver, sea urchins and chopped sorrel and fresh rhubarb». A queue is already forming up. |
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Sasajima, if Kyoto were in Italy... The return of Yasuhiro Sasajima to Identità – those with a strong memory will remember him on the Milanese stage, during the third edition, in 2007 – is in contraposition with a novelty, that of having a non-Italian chef to speak within the Identità di Pasta format, something unprecedented. The chef of Il Ghiottone, this is the exact name – a restaurant in Tokyo and one in Kyoto – for a few years now has been the author of one of the most convincing cuisines, in its way of bordering between Japanese and Italian influences.
This project was born at the end of the Eighties in Kyoto, the city where he was born, when France haute cuisine was quite in fashion, next to the dominant local kaiseki. «I didn’t want to continue to replicate traditional French dishes all life long. I told myself: if in Italy there is such a strong use of local products, why not preparing original Italian cuisine with the local ingredients from around my town?». And that was it.
The lecture in Milan (at 11.10) is titled “The face of an imaginary Kyoto in Italy” and it is easy to foresee the use of many vegetables and aromatic herbs, together with pasta, given that they abundantly grow around the imperial town. There will also be a combination of umami and sapidity in the fermented products of his country, together with extra virgin olive oil. By travelling often around the best trattorias in our country, he has learned the techniques and secrets of Italian. |
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Enrico Bartolini, the nice side of acidity  In order to come into contact with all the monumental knowledge accumulated over the years by Enrico Bartolini (at 12.05), it would be enough to buy his book “Pasta”, published by Reed Gourmet, 120 recipes perfectly balanced between fresh egg pasta, filled pasta and the dried varieties. However, the chef of Devero tells us «Until a few years ago I wasn’t serving a single dried pasta dish in the restaurant. I believed it couldn’t please the artisanal skills of a chef. I soon understood it was a stupid thought: when it is well made, durum wheat pasta is very good and elegant. The effort of giving it personality and taste is up to us».
The Spaghetti with smoked eel, a sort of amatriciana pasta made with fish, «is a dish I cannot seem to be able to take off the menu: it finely gives value to the acidity of the ingredients such as the red vinegar, added at the beginning, or the lemon zest and Eugenio Pol’s bread crust in the end». Acid elegance, a distinctive mark of our chef, is a solution that we will be able to test in person in Sala Blu 1, at the end of the lesson. Before then, there will be three dishes of which we cannot unveil too many secrets. We can only anticipate that Bartolini has taken the pasta and changed its appearance, a moderated bending in line with his “contemporary classic” philosophy. We can say, at least, that the lesson will begin with a film that celebrates Oil and lime bottoni with sauce and cacciucco, the mother of all of Bartolini’s pasta dishes. (photo credits www.ilcittadinomb.it)
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Alija, the Basque who loved durum wheat With Basque cuisine ace, Josean Alija, comes a second non-Italian chef on the stage of Identità di pasta (at 2.10 pm). This happens not because the chef of Nerua – a fantastic restaurant enclosed in Bilbao’s Guggenheim, chosen in fact by Michelin to present the latest edition of the Spanish guide – is married to an Italian, but because he loves to tackle the great expressions of durum wheat more than any other chef in the Spanish land.
A first great chapter, in this sense, was written over 4 years ago: Josean prepared Caserecce cooked in 4 stocks revived thanks to different aromas: rosemary, basil, Angelet green pepper and salted codfish skin, a dish that the local press called divine, legitimizing the use of pasta in Spanish kitchens. «For me, pasta is an art, the expression of a simple pleasure». This is the leitmotif of his speech in Milan, after his masterly ponencia held on the occasion of the Madrid Fusion congress, a few days ago.
In that case, the chosen theme was that of sauces, “transformed products, of vegetal origin, from their solid to their liquid state”. In the Basque region, the most common expressions are green sauce, vizcaina sauce, pil pil and black sauce. Who knows if the theme selected for the Milanese congress will be that of matching two worlds that have never been close, two apparently waterproof cultures. Apparently indeed. |
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Giuseppe Iannotti, contemporary Sannio  We call Giuseppe Iannotti on his way back from the fish market. And it seems like destiny because almost every time, some marine notes enrich his first courses. Put in these words, it sounds limiting. To begin with, let’s say that for the chef from Sannio «dried pasta has an important role in traditional dishes while fresh egg pasta plays a dominating role in experimental dishes, thanks to the greater versatility allowed by its fillings». Indeed, during the Milano Food & Wine Festival he will cook «Fresh egg pasta cappelletti filled with Neapolitan ragù, prepared with 5 cuts of meat divided between beef, pork and lamb, and San Marzano tomatoes in three ways: peeled, in sauce, and concentrated».
The story will be completely different in the case of his lesson for Identità di Pasta (at 3 pm). Iannotti is an unaware follower of a famous formula by Davide Scabin: «Pasta can also be a first course». In fact, he rightly adds, «Pasta is a first course only in Italian tradition because in the rest of the world it is a side dish that, very often, lacks in substance and pairing». The 3 dishes by the chef from Sannio, in Milan, will all have to do with dried pasta and fish. The first is a starter: «It will be a new interpretation of Pennette with cream and salmon, with a sphere of crème fraîche with trout and four different kinds of pasta». The second, is a first course: «a traditional Pasta and beans with mussels, using large mussels from Galicia and oil caviar». Finally, a dessert, «Fried tagliolini, in the shape of a cannolo, with a chantilly cream aromatised with Strega Alberti and annurche apple chips». A hymn to Benevento.
All the dishes are debuting and will be soon available in the menu of his restaurant in Telese Terme, the worthy followers of the successes already achieved by his Spaghetti with sea urchin mayonnaise, pink pepper and lemon balm or Ravioli filled with buffalo milk mozzarella with red prawn and raw rabbit ragù. |
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The silence before the hurricane: Davide Scabin At 3.50 pm it will be the turn of Davide Scabin, aka Mister Pasta. What is to be expected of the lesson of the chef from Rivoli is yet to be known. Every year the silence is desired so that the uproar can explicitly resonate between the walls of Sala Blu 1, amplified by partner Felicetti. It will be useful to recall the content of the lessons given in the past three years.
2011 was the year of pasta in infusion, put into boiling water and then left to relax in hot water, with a drop of oil and some pecorino, or with a dress made of mussels’ cooking water, white wine and capers. It was also the year of the evolution of pasta sushi, with conchiglioni pasta holding a heart of squid and coriander, salmon in wasabi, sea urchin.
In 2012, the dishes were three: two “chef” creations and a “dissociated” and provocative use of pasta. The first was an Onion cooked in the oven and stuffed with spaghetti and vegetables, which again were cooked in infusion. Then there was the Rigatone – boiled, browned in the pan and filled with carbonara – which wasn’t a first course but a side dish for a seafood salad. Finally, there were the 3 expressions of Pasta Warriors: fusillone wrap, spaghettone Twa in the shape of a pill and penne squeeze – which would later become a cult.
How about last year? It was the year of Combal space lasagne, dehydrated and vacuum cooked in an aluminium pack, designed for the ISS (International Space Station) astronauts. Who, in fact, later left for a mission and got back to Earth fitter than ever. |
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Norbert Niederkofler, crazy for paccheri In this moment, Norbert Niederkofler’s biggest concern is finding some spades to remove the snow that has fallen in front of the entrance to St Hubertus del Rosa Alpina: «I can’t recall a stronger snowfall in years», he says on the phone. Warming him up, inside, there’s the eternal love for pasta, which is not the fresh one, most common in Alto Adige’s tradition, «but the dried one, cooked properly al dente: I’m crazy about paccheri», he explains.
He’s a promoter of the moving of flavours from South to the Alpine peaks: «Two years ago, the Fusillo made with burnt wheat supplied for me by a Neapolitan pasta-factory had quite a success. I would cook it with porcini and carob. It was a first course with strong flavours, which would last for a long time, in the palate and in the memory, just the way I like it». A few months ago, however, there was a turning point with Cook the mountains: all that NN puts in the dish must be the expression of the lands that surround him. «At Identità (lesson at 4.40 pm, Editor’s note) I will present a pasta made with an ancient variety of local durum wheat, resulting in an experimental dish, with a very clean flavour».
Pasta needs to be a first course, and nothing else: «During the years I spent working in Germany, I couldn’t stand when it was served as a side dish. I totally disagree. On the contrary, I am very much in favour of pasta as the pillar of a single-dish-meal: for those who practice a lot of sport, like me, mixing carbohydrates and proteins is the top». |
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Antonia Klugmann, starch obsession The curtain call of the fifth edition of Identità di pasta will entirely belong to Antonia Klugmann (lesson at 5.30 pm). For the chef from Friuli now working in Venice, durum wheat is an obsession: «I love all sorts of pasta: long, short, dry, fresh, filled. Most of all, I’m interested in starch. Those who do not have a basic scientific approach, like me, are impressed by gluten’s reaction to water. It’s pure magic».
The masters in this field are in the East: «The wafers and spaghetti that the Japanese are capable of obtaining by pressing buckwheat and drying it are incredible. I tried to do it many times but I never managed to obtain any worthy result». Instead, she’s really successful in the interpretation of two dishes she will bring to Milan: «In the first, I use Benedetto Cavalieri’s Spaghettone. As for the second dish, I’m still uncertain whether to use a short sized pasta made with spelt, or Felicetti’s Spaghetto with squid ink, which I used a lot when I was still working at Ridotto in Venice: I will cook it in tomato water and serve it with black truffle and a mushroom gel slightly thickened with tapioca».
Her way of interpreting western durum wheat is based on a precise concept: «Pasta should always be interpreted as an ingredient, never as a back-up. This is how we can make the best use of it». |
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