"Shall we make a quick kebab?". “Tonight I would really like a nice sushi”. Phrases, these, more and more recurring in the daily life of Italians, especially those of big cities, who now prefer (or at least alternate) to the traditional dish of pasta or pizza the whim, practicality and convenience of foreign cuisine, especially the oriental (Chinese and Japanese), Arab and South American.
According to data from the Milan Chamber of Commerce, in fact, by now one restaurant business out of 20 in Italy is foreign, with an increase of almost 12% in 2011 compared to the previous year, against a growth of only 2,7% of the entire sector. Nothing more normal, in a country where almost one resident out of fourteen is of foreign origin.
In 2011 they register 15.600 businesses managed by foreigners, of which about ten thousand actual restaurants (61,3%), over 6.000 bars and cafes (38,7%). Ethnic catering about one in four speak Chinese (with 23,6% of sole proprietorships with foreign owners active in the sector, equal to 3.687 firms) but the Arab contingent also defends itself which, among the various nationalities, holds one business out of five (20,3% equal to approximately 3.200 sole proprietorships, half of which are Egyptians) and Latin Americans with almost one out of twelve businesses (7,5% of the total, 1.168 businesses).
The Chinese are also the most transformative, given that the data refers only in part to real Chinese cuisine restaurants: the fashion is already about to be overcome, since they now manage more bars (53%) than restaurants, and more and more often they use to offer Japanese or fusion cuisine.
Milan and in general are the masters of this new trend Lombardy, where 26,8% of sole proprietorships are managed by foreigners (+14,3% in one year, against an overall growth of the sector of 4,3%). The Milanese ethnic catering speaks above all Chinese, in 57% of the cases, followed by the Arab army (Egyptians in primis), which accounts for a total of 26,4%, while there are only 50 Latin American establishments (4,4% of the total foreigners). South America, on the other hand, is the most popular in Rome, which is the second Italian province after Milan for the percentage of businesses managed by non-Italians (8% of the total against 12,2): the capital is first for the number of Latin American restaurateurs (7,6% of the total in Italy).
Therefore Milan capital of ethnic cuisine, with a strong oriental cadence. But the forerunner of this new trend is the foreigner you don't expect: neither Egyptian nor Chinese, the oldest still active ethnic restaurant in the city is Lebanese, open since 1974. It is the Academy of Aziz Afif, in the Lambrate area: when the Milanese still didn't walk around with kebabs in hand, there you could already taste the delicious taboulè and felafel typical of Arab cuisine.
