One sits in the shadow of the Madonnina and suddenly, as if by magic, one finds himself 800 km away, far from the mists and mists of Milan, sitting in the shadow of Vesuvius, immersed in the blue sea of the Gulf of Naples, from a side and Salerno on the other, in front of dishes that explode with the Mediterranean sun.
This is what can happen to those who decide to sit at a table IT Restaurant in Via dei Fiori Chiari, in the midst of the fashionable Milanese nightlife, a must for excellent restaurants, design shops, fashion shops, vintage curiosities and antiques.
In the historical Gondrand Palace, which over time has hosted the Ferré fashion house from the famous transport company, temple of fashion since the 90s, then Kiton, the great Neapolitan brand of Italian haute couture tailoring that has expanded from Naples all over the world, has landed a… formula, the one that the entrepreneur Alessio Matrone created in Ibiza, four years ago, on the beautiful Botafoch Marina, landing place for luxury yachts from all over the world, giving life to It Restaurant cWith the advice of Gennarino Esposito the two Michelin star Chef of Torre del Saracino in Vico Equense. A formula that has literally exploded in one of the most enchanting corners of the Balearics based on Mediterranean and above all Neapolitan cuisine, products of the local area or specially brought in from Italy, on fresh preparations in which to perceive Mediterranean scents and sensations, enriched by the musical entertainment with the best DJs, supplemented by events, meetings and spontaneous events. The whole in the name of fun, which characterizes the general atmosphere of the IT formula, in the kitchen as in the dining room, among the staff and among the customers. And obviously there is no chef more suitable than Gennaro Esposito to make this joie de vivre shine through from the kitchen to the dishes.
From Ibiza, this year, this formula has been transferred hand in hand to Milan.
The result is a welcoming space with an urban and elegant style that is divided into three different areas on 800 square meters: the Bistrot for a lunch break or an evening cocktail; the restaurant, the heart of the building, which is shown to customers from large windows and on the lower floor the lounge restaurant for dinners and private events.
In the kitchen, the arduous task of inheriting the executive baton of the great indications of Gennaro Esposito, and above all of supervising a brigade that has to manage such demanding spaces, is a young Chef from Salerno, Aldo Ritrovato, 34 years old, a law degree thrown away at the moment in which he received the vocation from an internal voice that made him extinguish his dreams as a lawyer and virtually light the stove fires before his eyes. From which when he was a boy in Calabria where his parents taught, he received great sensations, because both his mother and his four aunts, "great cooks for sons and husbands", recalls Aldo, did their utmost to bring out of their kitchens dishes of their family traditions to raise the dead. And add to it that the young Aldo has never resisted the temptations of food since he was a child. The childhood spent in Calabria can be found in the first course that he cooked himself, "Mezze penne with tomato and nduja". The result? “I was very satisfied”, there's nothing more to add.
Obviously the vocation, the mother and the aunts could not be enough, the young Aldo understands that he needs to learn techniques and secrets on a very different level. And he chooses the most difficult but also the most educational path, he enrolls in the Italian cooking course at Alma, one of the most prestigious cooking schools in our country founded in 2004 by the chef Gualtiero Marchesi based in the magnificent Farnese palace considered the University of gastronomes, from whose ranks some of today's most authoritative Italian chefs have emerged.
Obviously, after Marchesi's school, important doors opened up for Ritrovato. Those of Torre del Saracino where he has the opportunity to compare his ideas with those of Gennaro Esposito, they are on the same wavelength: the passion for a cuisine with a smile and sunny flavors and colours. And a partnership was born with Esposito that was destined to last over time. But Ritrovato also takes the road of the Langhe arriving at what has been defined as a real gastronomic atelier, the restaurant of Piazza Duomo in Alba, where the multi-starred chef, Enrico Crippa, celebrates and metabolizes the flavors of this area with an all-Japanese aesthetic and meticulousness, to use the expression of the Red Guide.
It's not a random choice. Aldo Ritrovato had long been rooted in the belief that his cuisine had to breathe not only the fragrant atmosphere of Salerno but also the gastronomic traditions of the North. And what could be better than Piedmont with its Langhe, with their fine wines of old tradition, with their meats, their cheeses, their fondues, their truffles, their bagna caode, their game, the their tajarion of thirty yolks? The study and direct experience with one of the noblest gastronomic traditions of the North mark his further growth with their culture, in a certain sense they close the circle of his professional training and his completeness as a Chef of rank, a marriage if we will difficult but successful.
From the Langhe to Milan the step is short and before arriving at IT Restaurant, Aldo Ritrovato, burning all the stages, manages to settle in the prestigious restaurant of the Bulgari Hotel. An important experience that greatly broadens his horizons. "Every change I've made has brought about gratification, perhaps the greatest when they asked me to carry on the kitchen of the Bulgari Hotel Milano for a while, we went on for a year and a half with great results and a lot of satisfaction".
IT Restaurant therefore becomes for Aldo Ritrovato a place where memory merges and dialogues with the present, playing between respect for tradition and reinterpretation, interpreting fidelity and modernity in an essential kitchen concept: they belong to the memory Ventresca of fried tuna and sweet and sour red onion "typical Calabrian dish that we made in the first restaurant where I worked - he remembers - simple but to do it we use the basic techniques to work in the kitchen" and the Risotto, scampi lemon and smoked mozzarella, one of the first courses put on the list, a tribute to the old seafaring traditions of the Gulf of Salerno and never removed from the menu, the squid stuffed with vegetables and escarole, the mixed pasta soup, shellfish and rock fish, the fillet of beef, annurca apple and chicory. The present includes the pluma of pork, caramelized onion and blueberries in gin, the veal cutlet alla Milanese, the loin of lamb, tarallo and broccoli rabe cream, the tagliolini, fassona tartare and gramolada. The final babà is then something that belongs to the past, present and future.
He had to work hard to get where he is today, and above all he had to neglect his family affections. One of his great worries, a sacrifice that had been predicted to him since his days at the Alma when his eyes were opened to the fact that the life of chefs is not all rosy as it appears on television, but is made up of sacrifices, constant commitment , endless schedules, renunciation of many pleasures. Governing an 800-square-foot space at 34 requires steady nerves, self-possession, the ability to concentrate, and organization to excess. And Aldo managed not to change his character, he didn't let himself be confused by the flattery of success, indeed perhaps some aspects of his personality, such as the desire to be in company, the taste for conviviality, the pleasure of joking with friends, applied to the command of his numerous brigade, have helped him to best interpret the philosophy of IT Restaurant in the kitchen, a different place, conceived by the duo Matrone-Esposito as a metropolitan extension of the healthy boho-chic atmosphere of the carefree Ibizan summer, however in a Mediterranean-Neapolitan key. It is no wonder then that the flavors of its dishes push the imagination of its patrons far away.
