Roland Trettl meets Antonino Cannavacciuolo

Antonino, il Grande

Even Roland Trettl looks up to great chefs like Antonino Cannavacciuolo. And he is happy to do so, as he explains in his travel report from Piedmont.

“Try it!” says Antonino, pushing over a plate full of food. “Linguine di Gragnano con calamaretti spillo, salsa al pane di Fobello” – or in English linguine with baby squid and bread sauce. Seems simple: a sauce made from a special Italian brown bread, walnuts, raisins, thyme and garlic cooked in fish stock. The calamaretti are then quickly fried with garlic. The linguine are cooked in water and then stewed in olive oil and stock. And finally chopped parsley is added. But sheer amazement takes hold right after the first taste! One of the best three meals of my life.

Approaching the “Villa Crespi” hotel and restaurant on Lake Orta at the heart of Piedmont, it’s hard to know whether to laugh or cry: this late 19th century operatic-style building has a carved minaret tower. Endless kitsch, but flashy enough to really have something special. The fourteen rooms have been skilfully furnished by Antonino Cannavacciuolo and his wife Cincia down to the very last detail to elegantly counteract the kitsch look. The restaurant contains white set tables and well-accented lighting. Even I found the interior homely and charming and I am a fan of clear lines.

Chef Antonino is a mountain among men and significantly taller and wider than me. In all directions. It’s surprising to see him play with his young daughter Elisa. This dry and cool Bud Spencer of the kitchen suddenly becomes all soft-centred. So it’s not that hard after all to wrap a great chef around your little finger!

I was fairly sure that our meeting would lie somewhere between sincere and spontaneous and very chaotic – the people of South Tyrol know their fellow countrymen! And I was right with “sincere and spontaneous” as it took just a few minutes for us to fall into friendly banter. This only happens in Italy if someone likes you. And there was no hint of chaos. In just one hour, we had our menus ready and some well thought-out recipes.

The menus definitely have what it takes. The lukewarm piadina served with wafer-thin raw ham, the grissini or the doughnut-like zeppole made from batter and algae certainly have the required attention-grabbing effect. As simple as they seem, they are cooked in Antonino’s own unique style. Which I would like to demonstrate with the following dish: Crudo di gamberi, Caviale, Crema di tuorli d’uovo di Paolo Parisi, Insalatina di cipollotti. You simply take raw prawns and place them on unmixed raw egg yolk, cream and salt. Then add a dollop of caviar and small grated onions. This can only work with the specific products Antonino uses in his kitchens. If he uses egg yolk then the eggs come from chickens reared by a specific farmer in Livorno. We will be cooking this dish at “Hangar-7” – of course using exactly these eggs. And it goes without saying that the prawns are special prawns from Sicily. Antonino’s cooking is defined by its almost alarming levels of simplicity combined with unsurpassable products and an unbelievable feel for the fine-tuning of the minimal taste components involved. One thing is for sure: anyone combining mozzarella-like burrata with a creamy blanched frisée lettuce cannot hide anything. Either it is completely perfect or totally insignificant. And anyone serving pigeon with braised goose liver on a simple-looking grape sauce must be 100% certain that the sauce is excellent.

Antonino Cannavacciuolo was born in South Italy but sees himself as an intermediary between the North and South in terms of his product interests. Why else would he call one of his menus: “Itinerario dal Sud al Nord Italia”. He has already secured himself two Michelin stars for this journey from South to North Italy and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the next Italian chef to receive a third Michelin star looks like Bud Spencer.

Aufgezeichnet von Christoph Schulte • Fotos: Damiano Levati / Red Bull Photofiles