He loves Italy so much…
«I have always looked at Italy with great affection, it is no coincidence that my first book is called Alain Ducasse’s Riviera. It is my second country, the closest to my heart and taste. I always find it interesting, from south to north, each region with its identity, food, culture.”
It is no coincidence that in December he arrived in Rome where he opened his restaurants inside the Romeo hotel. Do you fear the capital?
«I have already been in Italy for ten years, at Andana, with the Moretti family, but Rome it’s Rome. We will create a cuisine that is part of the local one without touching the typical dishes of the city, otherwise it would be like competing with the pasta prepared by mother or with sushi in Tokyo. Rather, they will be flavors of the Mediterranean tradition, as I have already done in Monte Carlo at the Louis XV, the restaurant of the Hotel de Paris (three stars in the Michelin guide in 1990, the first hotel restaurant to obtain the maximum recognition of the “Red”, ed.). And it certainly won’t be French cuisine.”
How much does French cuisine influence Italian cuisine and vice versa?
«France influenced Italian cuisine in terms of technique, certainly not in terms of taste. We have the so-called professionalism. Do you think that in my school in Meudon (near Paris), I have people of 74 different nationalities and they all learn the basics; it’s like solfeggio for music, then everyone plays their own. We codified certain passages centuries ago, although it must be said that one of the first cookbooks in history with recipes is Italian (refers to‘Opera by Bartolomeo Scappi, he will tell me latered.)”.
And the Italian?
«Yours is a matriarchal cuisine, which comes from your mother….
True, but starred kitchens are mostly full of men…
«Ah, les machos! In France they are still very chauvinist, Italy follows, Spain is even worse! But the last are the Catalans!
Do you find that home cooking is the protagonist in so-called “haute cuisine”?
«Yes, except that you have to do everything perfectly, sublimate it. I remember a dough with brewer’s yeast and butter Riccardo Camanini. Rigor, perfection… I was seduced by simplicity and goodness at the same time. I love simplicity when it becomes absolute and transforms into perfection. Or, again, I think of “boys” as Davide Oldani who from a small restaurant in a small village has created a destination with uncommon professionalism. He does a very good job, very good! And let’s not talk about Maximò (Bottura), extraordinary! They were all with me in Monaco, even Gennarino (Esposito from Vico Equense).”
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