<div>As a country we love Italian food. Our love for pasta is universal. Be it birthday parties or wedding receptions, live pasta counters are a must. From standalone restaurants in malls and neighbourhood markets to fancy ones in five-star hotels, every outlet serving Italian food has a variety of pasta dishes on offer. In fact, for most of us, Italian food is equivalent to pasta and vice-versa. So imagine my surprise when I looked at the 8-course Italian menu (including two desserts) prepared by Chef Giovanni D’Amato at the JW Marriott Juhu in Mumbai recently and found no pasta! Of course, D’Amato is no ordinary chef — his restaurant Ristorante il Rigoletto in Italy is a 2-Michelin star restaurant and he is a Relais & Chateaux grand chef. On the other hand, I’m no food expert and my understanding of food is restricted to the way it tingles my taste buds. So I did expect a fancy menu, but was not prepared for the complete absence of that Italian staple. “There is a lot more to Italian food than just pasta. I want diners to get a taste of it,” smiles D’Amato. <br /><br />And over the next two hours, he went on to do just that. The vegetarian taster’s menu that I had, started with a vegetable cream soup made from cherry tomatoes blended with pine nuts and served at room temperature with caper berries and Kalamata olives. The non-vegetarians started their meal with black truffle mushroom slow cooked and garnished with a carrot and ginger sorbet, and served with clam and croutons.<br /><br /><img width="640" height="359" src="/image/image_gallery?uuid=1e437c33-06ca-42ad-b374-9ac77d16aeb8&groupId=222861&t=1431350463853" alt="" /><br /><br />D’Amato, who started his career at the age of 26 when he set up his restaurant in a small village some 70 km from Verona, loves cooking traditional fare with a focus on fresh, natural ingredients, many of them raw. So for their next course, the non-vegetarians had a tomato-based prawn puree served with raw tuna, pan seared scallops, seabass, clams and mussels. <br /><br />“My grandparents owned a trattoria (restaurant) in Tuscany and I spent hours there as a kid. Even when I was little, I knew I wanted to become a ‘Grand Chef’ though I didn’t know what it meant.” Today his son, Frederico, is also a chef working alongside D'Amato. <br /><br />The next course for me was the highlight of the evening. It comprised of celeriac, that unsung hero of the vegetable world, knobbly and odd-shaped with celery-like flavour, cooked in vegetable stock and served with beetroot cream and mashed potato cream. And just as I was about to dig in, the server poured some jasmine tea on it to provide the ‘right amount of tangy acidity’. <br /><br />The freshness of ingredients are of utmost importance to D’Amato. “I personally go to the market every morning to pick the best produce,” he says, adding, “I only use seasonal vegetables.” In fact, it is the ingredients that inspire him. “I love looking at them and deciding what to cook.”<br /><br />In Mumbai for the pop up organised by JW Marriott, Juhu, in partnership with 4xFour, Singapore, an expert in pop-up dining experiences with handpicked Michelin star chefs from across the globe, D’Amato was amazed by the variety of fresh ingredients available in the local markets. “We didn’t bring anything with us except our knives,” he laughs. All the ingredients, including the spices were sourced in Mumbai. D’Amato also used a lot of local ingredients such as paprika, curry leaves and small limes in his dishes. “I like to experiment with ingredients in hand.” <br /><br />The shellfish cappuccino served with seared scallops was prepared specifically for the pop up. “We may introduce the dish in our restaurant in Italy.” <br /><br />Keeping the Indian palate in mind, D’Amato included a saffron risotto on the menu. A creamy yellow- coloured risotto garnished with strands of saffron, roasted hazelnuts and pureed vegetables that had me asking for more. “Indians like rice and saffron is used in Indian food.” The saffron risotto, explains D’Amato, is an adaptation of the risotto Milano which uses saffron along with bone marrow stock. The one served here uses vegetable stock. <br /> <br />I’ve never been a big fan of artichoke and so wasn’t looking forward to the artichoke confit, but it turned out to be surprisingly good.<br /><br />The main course over, it was time for the two dessert courses. The first was a strawberry flavoured yoghurt ice cream served with beetroot jelly, raspberry puree and raspberry powder. Definitely refreshing after a heavy meal. But it was the tiramisu explosion — a deconstructed version of the classic Italian dessert, it had a coffee meringue and coffee crumble with a disc of dark chocolate on top — that had me licking my plate clean. <br /><br />At the end of the wonderful meal, I, for one, did not miss the pasta. <br /><br />(This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 18-05-2015)</div>
