Cracco, Perbellini, Iannone, Mazzei e Arrus: Talking of a star-studded dinner…

Put together five super-chefs – Carlo Cracco, Giancarlo Perbellini, Rocco Iannone, Francesco Mazzei and Antonello Arrus – with Giancarlo Aneri’s best wines, the famous Hell’s Kitchen, and serve it all in the heavenly setting of Forte Village at Santa Margherita di Pula… and you have a perfect recipe for a truly star-studded dinner!

“It was an exceptional evening,” commented Rocco Iannone, the great ‘craftsman’ of Italian cuisine and purist for local produce, “it was a great encounter between the finest representatives of the cuisine of North and South Italy.”

The first to open the challenge was Carlo Cracco, who proposed “marinated egg yolk with Tuscan bread soup and sweet-sour vegetables”, accompanied by Aneri’s Leda Alto Adige Bianco doc 2012.

The same wine was chosen by Rocco Iannone, who amazed the company with his “pasta and potatoes with local seafood”. “I chose this dish,” he says, “to express the maximum of authenticity, a recipe from the Campania tradition but made exclusively with local produce: seafood from this fabulous island, potatoes from the Forte Village vegetable patch, hand-made durum-wheat pasta and Sardinian oil.”

Also Antonello Arrus based himself on the flavours of his native land and prepared “ravioli made with durum wheat pasta, filled with burrata, Calabrian sgranata and Mustia ricotta petals”. For the wine he chose Aneri’s Leda Alto Adige Gewurztraminer Doc 2011.

Then came Francesco Mazzei, the globaliser of Calabrian ‘nduja, who presented “salt cod marinated in liquorice with red Tropea onion”, accompanied by Aneri’s Pinot Nero Ale doc 2010.

For a sweet ending, and that’s the right expression, Giancarlo Perbellini offered the company his “1900s Millefoglie” and “salt chocolate with hazelnuts and cognac”. Together with Lambrusco di Sorbara.

A dinner worthy of a Karen Blixen story, a true celebration of Italian-made culinary delights and, as Rocco Iannone is anxious to point out, “this could happen only at Forte Village, because with its wide choice it can give room to a variety of artists and creativities and the judge is always and exclusively the guest.”