Seeing him like this, at first glance, you remember, with that face cut with an axe, the long hair parted in half on the forehead like a helmet, the large black eyelashes, and the slit eyes that freeze you, a bit character like Asterix, the very famous French humorous-adventure comic series created in the 60s by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo which had a planetary fortune between books, films and gadgets.
And the comparison does not seem irreverent, because Philippe Leveillé, the great two-star Michelin chef of international renown, who for twenty years took office in Miramonti the other, refined and exclusive restaurant in Concesio in the province of Brescia, with the popular star of the strip, whom we have all loved, has a lot in common, having been born on the Breton coast, to be exact in Nantes, 56 years ago.
Like all Bretons, he carries with him a strong sense of pride of roots, and if Asterix represented a symbol of peasant stubbornness and hostility to the Roman invasion (behind which was hidden a very strong feeling of independence of the population towards the central state) Leveillé has inherited from his ancestors a strong sense of determination which leads him, if necessary, to be uncomfortable and a great rigor.
How does all of this translate into your cuisine? In a will, which knows no hesitation, in wanting to combine his culture of French training in respect of traditions with the "new world" of flavors and colors, of lightness and perfumes that opened before his eyes when he descended in Italy.
His cuisine is impactful, generous, and manages to combine the best French technique with Italian tradition, two worlds that meet and integrate with a strong sense of superior balance.
From beyond the Alps, the Breton chef brought the way of working, the cooking techniques, the rigor and the precise division of tasks for the brigade, the delicate preparations and the research. And in the Franciacorta area he found substance and inspiration to create his robust and savory dishes, so that in his menu the "galettes au blé noir" have the same dignity as the casoncelli, and the cider of the wine.
Of course, succeeding in an enterprise like this requires a long journey. It all starts from Jean Leveillé's oyster farm in Cancale, a picturesque town set in a dreamy shell-shaped bay facing the famous rocky islet of Mont-Saint-Michel and its medieval abbey, a must-see for all gourmets passionate about oysters and seafood. His father belongs to that category of men in perennial conflict with the hostile elements of nature, ready to risk their lives on stormy nights to save the fruit of their labor. His mother often cooks in the evening, indeed at night, because the men return from work late in the evening, we eat together with the employees, a sensational boeuf marbeuf a kind of braised meat cooked in cider, the alcoholic drink obtained from the fermentation of Breton apples while the men tell of their adventures. First lesson learned by the young man: work requires tenacity and sacrifice. Philippe, helping his father, gets to know some of the most important French chefs who go to Cancale to select or buy oysters for their restaurants. Friendships are born from acquaintances and some chefs invite Papa Jean and his son Philippe to visit them. "In those summers of my childhood and pre-adolescence - Leveillé recalls today - the doors of professional catering in the literal sense open before me for the first time, my innate and spontaneous love for food begins to take shape according to less immediate stimuli". Thus the idea that food as well as an enjoyment can also represent a future job begins to make its way in the 13-year-old boy.
Of course he certainly doesn't lack reasons for conviction. There in Mont Saint Michel there is an old traditional restaurant, a glory of the area, La mere Poulard, in the heart of the medieval village which in history has seen Great Masters such as Paul Bocuse Michel Guerard and George Leblanc at work in its kitchen. A world that begins to exert a strong fascination on the teenager Philippe.
But Brenno's sword that definitely motivates him on the balance of professional choices is the one that falls one day at school. Philippe is perhaps not the first in the class but he gets away with it. It happens because of "a small, very ugly and hateful woman, black, dry, the line of the eyebrows that does not break above the hooked nose, and a light but equally repulsive shadow of mustache on the lips: Madame Briand", her teacher her. In short, one of those negative characters that mark your life. Who hasn't had a Madame Briand to hate in their youth? In short, it happens that Briand, who had never had a liking for him, offends him heavily and also offends her family as a den "of morons". Philippe is 13 and can't see anymore, he gets up and throws a chair at the teacher. Result he is expelled.
What to do? Going back to school is impossible, but the path to the hotel school (already virtually traced in Philippe's brain, as we have seen) takes shape in the young man's immediate horizon. And so the Leveillé boy makes his triumphal entry into the prestigious Saumur school, one of the oldest schools in all of France created by Maurice Edmond Seiland known as Curnonsky, one of the sacred monsters of French gastronomy, to whom we owe after the exaltation of international cuisine of the hotels supported by Escoffier to have rehabilitated the traditional popular and bourgeois cuisine. I spend four years in Saumur and learn almost everything he knows about French cuisine. At the conclusion of the course out of 1200 boys he comes third with honors. And this opens the doors to the legendary Lucas Cartona di Pace de la Magdeleine restaurant in Paris where he goes to work in a real kitchen brigade as a commis.
“At the age of 17, entering Lucas Carton means entering history, the first opening of the restaurant dates back to 1839 with the programmatic name of la Taverne de la France when Charles Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, the future emperor of France Napoleon III, frequented it assiduously. In 1933 Lucas Carton was the first restaurant in France and therefore in the world to achieve three stars in the Michelin guide": Leveillé entered the large kitchen like an arrow and through the main door, something that made your wrists tremble. However, the boy has his feet firmly in his Breton peasant tenacity, he doesn't get overwhelmed and in moments of freedom he regularly goes to eat in the most popular Parisian bistros "I beat them to the carpet one after the other, I try to understand them, engaging my memory in the most authentic French culinary atmospheres”, wants to enter the heart of the territory.
As commis Leveillé he is in charge of cleaning the fish and opening the oysters in the cellar. And here another miracle happens: one day the chef Alain Senderens himself goes to inspect the cellar, appreciates his order, his dexterity, his dedication and moves him to the stove. He will work directly under the chef de partie poissonnier, the fish chef.
With a Lucas Carton honor on his chest, there are no boundaries for Philippe Leveillé, and wherever he goes, the doors of the most prestigious restaurants are open to him, from the Hotel Winsor Clovis to the Hotel Helton Kennedy in New York, from the Boucairre Meridiane in Martinique, up to the Vis Palace Grand Corniche in Montecarlo. It is in the good round and also passes through Argentina, Venezuela and Brazil.
Until one day, he was in Rio de Janeiro on a yacht, he meets a group of Italians who tell him about chef Vittorio Fusari. This intrigues him, he gets on a sailboat headed for Portugal and from there he arrives at Fusari. Someone who likes to say: “Passion for the Lombardy region, creativity, fairness, ethics and solidarity are the ingredients of my cuisine. A cuisine that chooses to preserve the memory of its culture and origins, and to feed by favoring healthy raw materials in respect of the slow passing of the seasons. A kitchen that is also capable of innovating, creating great dishes suitable for today's life". It is music to the ears of Leveillé who is immediately linked by elective affinity to the Italian Chef. Affinity that becomes collaboration with the "Maschere di Iseo", where Leveillè remained from 1987 to 1991, winning the first Michelin star together with Fusari. From here he moved for a year to the restaurant "Antico Ponte di Briolo" where for five generations the Assolari family has religiously cared for the traditions of Bergamo cuisine so that they are not forgotten. Another experience that introduced him to the secrets of Nordic Italian cuisine
But the great turning point in Philippe Leveillé's professional and private life comes with his landing in 1992 at the Miramonti di Caino, historic restaurant on the road that connects the Trompia valley with the Sabbia valley in the province of Brescia and the meeting with the Piscini family, who had founded it, bringing it to fame, 50 years earlier. With the Piscini a spark is ignited which becomes a real fire of mutual admiration and loyalty. In 1994, when the Piscinis decide to transfer the restaurant to Concesio, still in Brescia, calling it Miramonti the other, Leveillè is now part of the family, something so perceived that he will end up marrying Daniela Piscini, daughter of the owners and who today she is also his workmate.
But beyond the fire of love for Daniela, Philippe Leveillé is overwhelmed by an extraordinary admiration for his mother Maria Muffolini, home chef, Michelin star in 1991, from whom he learns traditional Italian dishes and the fundamental principles and techniques.
The great technique of Philippe, who masters the academy, humbly meets the unsurpassed savoir-faire of Mary Piscini. The lady from Miramonti passed on to him the secrets of cult dishes such as risotto with mushrooms and sweet mountain cheese.
And when the baton changes hands when Philippe inherits Miramonti's cuisine, that mixture of Gallic-Lombard cultures which had been the subject of constant comparison, study and in-depth analysis between mother-in-law and son-in-law in front of Miramonti's stoves, it translates into the second Michelin star.
In the menus signed by Philippe we find timeless dishes such as the lacquered quail, the frogs sautéed in garlic and parsley butter or the Crescendo of lamb with a carrè finish, a dish inspired by Signora Veronelli, 12 fifth-quarter recipes that surround the carrè in the center of the dish.
But Philippe wants, with his daily selected ingredients, to bring back memories of his Brittany, to make his two souls dialogue even more, while listening to his deep Breton soul.
His experiences as a child, when he went with his oyster farmer father to fish for oysters brings them back to life with the sapidity and iodine that we find in the Cucumber with oysters and caviar, a dish that also includes flavors from China. The cucumber is marinated with the sweet and sour of the lime, the shallot gives the crunchiness, the oyster the iodine and the Calvisano caviar the sapidity. It is the dish that best expresses the chef's roots.
But it is not only Northern Italy that touches the sensitivity of the French-Italian chef and perhaps today it should be said more Italian-French.
With #I wanted to be a tomato!! Philippe Leveillé has been signing a dish born after a trip to Sicily and a lunch at Ciccio Sultano's on the menu for three years, which is a tribute to the deep south of Italy. It features a tartare of red prawns, lime, extra virgin olive oil, buffalo foam, with buffalo milk and cream covered with a veil of tomato served with a basil sorbet.
And finally another large plate signed by Philippe Lèveillè: Alice in Wonderland. A way of presenting a game, an imaginative world in which you immerse yourself losing the space-time coordinates. The world of the mad hatter, where vegetables are presented in 14 different ways of cooking like in a painting in Lewis Carroll's living room.
Flavours, combinations, often daring inventions, with no less often daring condiments, his is a greedy, buttery, generous cuisine where the lightness so fashionable at the moment is not a categorical imperative, because for Leveillé, who provocatively wrote a book dedicating it to Butter, the only God he bows down to is flavour. And all this was appreciated not only in Italy where he has established himself firmly at the top of fine cuisine but also abroad, where in Hong Kong he opened his own restaurant "L'altro" enjoying great success and with which, for only two months after opening, 2102 obtained a Michelin star.
Well-known TV face Philippe Leveillé has participated in MasterChef Italia on Sky Uno, The Chef, on La5, Beijing Express, on Rai 2, Igles & Friends on Gambero Rosso Channel, Chopped Italia, Food Network, Detto Fatto on Rai 2, The restaurant of the chefs on Rai 2. In all these broadcasts he stood out for his rigor in respect of raw materials, in the refusal of waste and in the practice of a cuisine that enhances the territory and its energies, the result of his youthful experience as a volunteer in Africa. “My relationship with food after the African experience – he declared – is no longer the same. In the first place in my work, wherever I happen to do it, there is only and only the sacred and obsessive respect for food, for all men's foods, a respect which since then assumes a form of ferocity and turns into hatred in the face of any waste to any behavior that expresses neglect or negligence towards the food whoever works in the kitchen with me is warned".
Mal blamed Federico, winner of the third edition of Masterchef. On that occasion, the contestant prepared a dish with the star ingredient of the test, frogs. Philippe criticized the minimalist choice of serving a very expensive raw material in almost invisible portions: «You are a doctor, you respect people. Learn to respect food », he told him, and sulking, rediscovering his Viking soul ..
In short, the Breton descended from Asterix enemy of the Romans ended up being much more Italian than he could have ever imagined as a young man when he was proud of his rebellious origins. So Italian that in 2017, on the initiative of the Italian Trade Agency and the Ente Nazionale Risi Philippe, he was appointed as risotto teacher to hold lessons at the Paul Bocuse cooking academy in Lyon and at the École Ferrandi in Paris .
And to think that everything stems from the "horrid ugly, hateful and black Madame Briand" to whom perhaps Italian gastronomy, given how things have gone, should perhaps address a grateful thought, if it hadn't been for that chair….
