Irrepressible, restless, impatient, always against the tide, Antonello Colonna, Chef-manager who started from a village restaurant run by his father in Labico, a small town unknown to most, about forty kilometers from Rome, in his quest for Michelin stars, haute cuisine , government consultancies, international gastronomic organizations, he can't sit idly by. Doesn't the City of Rome renew his contract with the scenographic space on the top floor of the National Gallery of Modern Art (a real affront to him as a collector of modern art and architecture enthusiast)? And he relaunched by setting up a Bistrò, 120 seats and open kitchen, in the Central Market of Termini Station, the enormous space, 1900 square meters, trendy-food of the capital, dominated by the Cappa Mazzoniana, visionary architecture created by Angiolo Mazzoni in the ' 30 on a wing, the largest railway station in the country, which houses 15 artisan shops of taste, bars, a pantry with a total turnover of 15 million euros, and 2 million admissions a year. At the same time, while he continues to take care of his innovative restaurant-hotel in Labico, the parent company has also landed in Fiumicino to offer high-level catering to travelers in transit at the Roman airport, the largest in Italy with 43 million passengers.
One year ago another blow of the wing. Chef Colonna, high priest of traditional Roman cuisine, brings the gastronomic Roman spirit to Milan, the territory of choice for Italian haute cuisine, where he opens Open Colonna in Piazza Cordusio, the financial heart of Milan. His cuisine, which does not deny its peasant origins and sinks its hands into the vegetable garden and farmyards, which uses the Roman countryside as “a precious grammar with which to always invent new syntaxes. An original language, but inspired by tradition. A cuisine of harmonies and earth, of geometries and modernity”, conquers the demanding Lombard palates, even if the new project is penalized by the Locdown, but much more is needed to stop Colonna.
And, in fact, is that enough? No way. The Lombard reality tickles the inventiveness and imagination of the Lazio chef.
As the great Albert Einstein said: “We cannot expect things to change if we continue to do the same things. Crisis is the greatest blessing for people and nations, because crisis brings progress. Creativity is born from anguish as the day is born from the dark night. It is in the crisis that inventiveness, discoveries and great strategies arise. Those who overcome the crisis overcome themselves without being 'surpassed'”.
Colonna has this sentence printed in huge letters in his mind, it seems written for him.
And here is the latest announcement, just at a time when many restaurateurs are throwing down their arms due to the difficulties of the moment and many foresee an extermination of closures due to the effects of the covid: Colonna instead throws himself into a new adventure he will open a restaurant in a factory, in the historic center of Como, 200 meters from the lake, in an old silk spinning factory. A new and very innovative adventure, therefore, and in grand style: a hundred seats, with a private room for private dinners. It will be a trattoria, bistro, pizzeria with wood-burning oven and lounge bar that the most Roman of chefs will open in the heart of the most Manzoni-like Lombardy. It will be a place aimed at a clientele ranging from 18 to 70 years of age, which will offer smart spaces but also discreet and comfortable spaces for business dinners "because Roman cuisine has an increasingly younger audience that joins the faithful, and I - underlines Colonna – I continue on my identity”.
Scheduled to open on September 14th. On the menu are the classics of the cuisine loved by Aldo Fabrizi and Alberto: Sordi, amatriciana, cacio e pepe, gricia and carbonara. But there will be North-South contaminations with an amusing promiscuity, a tribute to Lake Como where lake fish will coexist, such as Missoltino, risotto, polenta. There will also be pizzas, because Colonna's idea is to host great pizza chefs in rotation in his Como restaurant.
