RIMINI: Wherever you walk in Rimini, the Italian coastal town on the Adriatic Riviera in Emilia Romagna made famous by one of the greatest film directors of all time Federico Fellini you see the mark he has left on the city. The cinema, the Grand Hotel Rimini, the museum, shops all pay tribute to the Italian legend.
Al Meni, the food festival that started nine editions ago in Rimini under the hospices of Massimo Bottura, has Fellini and poet Tonino Guerra as its inspiration. Held under a circus tent called Circo 8 e 1/2 like Federico Fellini’s film, the name Al Meni is the title of a poem by Guerra which means Hands in Romagnolo dialect.
Under the circus tent, 24 chefs from Italy and the Mediterranean basin came together to present dishes from their restaurants at street food prices. After two years in the city centre, the Circus tent went back to its original place in Piazza Fellini just in front of the Grand Hotel Rimini and the Mediterranean sea.
Massimo Bottura, chef of the three Michelin star restaurant Osteria Francescana in Modena but today also the CEO of Francescana group which is constantly in evolution is the person that has spearheaded the festival.
This year’s theme of the festival was the Mediterranean and Andrea Petrini, food writer and curator managed to assemble a team of chefs from the Mediterranean basin to accompany chefs from Emilia Romagna. It was a weekend of sharing knowledge, of food and exchanges of ideas.
Al Meni started with some news from Bottura who revealed that his dream of taking the festival across the Atlantic to the United States might become a reality. Fellini’s 8 1/2 circus tent could in the coming years be making a visit to New York’s Central Park or the High Line.
It was then the turn of Jessica Rosval and Matteo Zonarelli, chefs respectively of Casa Maria Luigia and Osteria Francescana to present their take on the Mediterranean. Rosval, the Canadian chef who heads Casa Maria Luigia did not work with fire here but instead presented three different types of couscous made with lentil, pea and chickpea flour in her take on the Mediterranean. The diversity came from the way the couscous was prepared, one with saffron, one with spices and another with herbs. Matteo Zonarelli on the other hand focused on sustainability. He used the remains of the fish used at Osteria Francescana including the livers to prepare a very intense sauce that was then topped with the fish eggs.
Simone Tondo, chef of Paris restaurant Racines is a permanent fixture of the festival being the only chef to have participated in all editions and he was there show cooking on Saturday afternoon in the scorching heat of an Italian summer.
In the evening it was the turn of a number of Italian chefs together with the international chefs present at Al Meni. Among them was Jeffrey Vella, a Maltese chef from restaurant Cap Aureo who is one of the leading chefs in Rovinj, Pavlos Kiriakis from The Zillers Athens, Tomer Tai from George and John and Maltese young promising chef Letizia Vella whose restaurant The Golden Fork moves from Attard to Rabat in Malta this summer.
Jeffrey Vella, with his ‘sustainable’ tuna hotdog created what was probably the longest queue of the festival. The tuna sausage was served with a sardine ketchup and a piccalilli sauce from mustard seeds and was the perfect comfort food and a vision of a future that focuses on sustainability.
With his part ready, he went to the back stage to assist Letizia Vella, the other Maltese chef at the festival (no relation to Jeffrey), who prepared a Maltese sourdough ‘dosa’ that was filled with cured sea bass and pickled caper leaves (foraged by Keith Abela of Natural Preserves Malta) and served with a mulberry foam and squid ink caviar.
Francesco Vincenzi from Franceschetta 58, the second restaurant of Massimo Bottura in Modena prepared stuffed courgettes with prawns while Pavlos Kiriakis from The Zillers in Greece made a delicious and comforting pita.
The day after two dishes stole the show. First there was Marco Ambrosino’s minestrone with grains from Sicily which packed incredible flavours for a dish of such seemingly simplicity. Using Sicilian grains, the chef from Milan restaurant 28 Posti served the pasta with the double fermented grains, herbs and olive oil and it was then topped with the cooked grains.
Iza Mazzocchi from Piacenza restaurant La Palta presented a dish that is currently on the menu at the restaurant, i.e. trout served with a broth of cherry and hazelnut leaves.
Italian chef Giovanni Cuocci of La Lanterna di Diogene and Greek chefs George Papazacharias and Thanos Feskos of Delta restaurant seemed to have shifted roles and cultures as if to show how the Mediterranean presents us with a melting pot of ideas and flavours. The Italian chef prepared a sheep gluten-free burger while the Greek duo prepared a lobster ravioli with a sauce of fermented strawberries and grilled prunes.
Florencia Montes, who left Mauro Colagreco and will be setting up a restaurant somewhere in the South of France probably close to Menton prepared a taco in form of a piadina with white shrimps from San Remo, cherries, basil and fresh almonds.
Needless to say, it was impossible to try all the dishes – there were 24 in all over two days but the above gives you an idea of the work that was carried out by the visiting chefs over the two days.
Outside the circus tent, there was the artisanal market bringing many artists from the region together while there was also a food market and space for discussions.
On Sunday, the Grand Hotel organised a picnic on the grass in front of the hotel while La Sangiovesa restaurant presented a book written by Giorgio Melandri and chef Massimiliano Mussoni on the 30 year history of this restaurant which is one of the region’s jewels in terms serving over 80,000 customers each year in a large osteria that delivers impressive quality.
What started off as an idea Massimo Bottura and Andrea Petrini had during a storm in Marseille at a cooking event that ended up being held under a big tent because of rain is set to reach its 10th edition next year with the possibility of a trip to the United States in the offing. As Massimo Bottura likes to say, in the future there is more future. You just have to work for it.
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