luca Digirolamo, executive sous chef at la Piazza, is all set to introduce Tuscan flavours to the menu. He tells Divya Kaushik that the Tuscan-Umbrian cuisine is famous for the use of herbs like thyme and sage and beans. In fact, Tuscans are often dubbed as mangiafagioli (bean eaters)
As per a famous Tuscan proverb it is good to cook like your mother and better if you cook like your grandmother. But this Tuscan always aimed to cook better than his mother and seems he knows little about his grandmother’s cooking. “In fact, the reason why I started cooking was because my mother was not a great cook. She used to work and come late and when she would return in the evening she would serve us cold cuts and say, ‘Ok, so we have one hour, have your dinner and go to bed.’ I wanted to eat something better so thought it will be better if I would cook on my own. I cooked for the first time when I was 11 while I was on a holiday with my parents. I cooked some canapes,” said chef luca Digirolamo, executive sous chef at la Piazza, Hyatt Regency.
It was an unusually busy day for the chef who had arrived in India just a few days ago. He conducted a special cook out session with MasterChef Australia contestant Sarah Todd at the Mansion to introduce some special Italian delicacies and cooking traditions from the region of Italy from where he comes. He began with the basics — how to roll the perfect pasta at home and prepare bisque — and went further to cook a la Piazza signature dessert, melting chocolate. He also cooked vegetarian sausage prepared with broccoli and chickpeas and served with braised lentils. He informed that beans and lentils form a significant part of cuisine from the Umbria region of central Italy, his native land. Common dishes that are cooked with beans are minestra di fagioli (bean soup) and pasta e ceci (chickpea pasta).
“The region is famous for food wine and extra virgin olive oil. We use grain meat as we have forests around us. We eat rabbit meat, wild boars and duck. Our cuisine is simple, seasonal and hearty. We prepare our food with herbs like thyme, rosemary, oregano, sage and chives. In southern Italy, oregano and thyme are used extensively in cooking. They eat mostly fish. Not many herbs are used for cooking in northern Italy because the climate is extremely cold. They only use mint and chives,” informed the chef. Apparently, his region is also known for the tradition of cucina povera, where Tuscans make sure that no part of the animal’s body goes waste in the process of cooking. Chef luca told us that one of the most popular delicacy from his region is porchetta rabbit, “which is like a barbeque dish prepared with the meat of rabbit. You cannot find it in any other part of Italy. The other porchetta that you find in other regions is mostly made with pork.”
The most important thing that makes the Italian cuisine special is the use of fresh ingredients. “We stay true to the seasons and only use fresh produce. Now that I am here at la Piazza you will see a special Tuscan touch to the cuisine and I will also serve a lot of vegetarian dishes with beans. We are also looking at the winter menu to make most of the seasonal produce. I used to run my own restaurant in Italy and the menu changed after every three months because we never stored anything, we only used what is available during particular months of the year,” said the chef who is a great fan of Indian and Arabian cuisine. He worked in the Middle East for a long time and therefore has an in-depth knowledge on the same. He even used to teach Arabian and Italian cooking back home. But for Indian food he had to research and read a lot. “My knowledge of Indian food has been limited as I only ate at Indian restaurants outside India that serve only dal, chicken tikka and a few curries. But Indian cuisine is vast and so diverse, very much like food in Italy. Through my research I found out that flavours of Indian and Italian cuisine are quite similar, therefore most Italians love Indian cuisine and vice versa. I am still discovering more about Indian food and looking forward to visit a spice market here to pick variety of spices,” he ended.