Natural, memory and instinctive. These are the coordinates of his culinary philosophy which speaks with the language of nature, which paints a colorful vision, in which the sounds of the territory are perceived, which tastes of those local products, for which we are famous in the world, which mix with suggestions distant, sometimes very distant, collected around the world but which is based above all in the aromatic herbs, spices, roots and plant species grown personally together with his staff in the garden and greenhouse.
For Michelangelo Mammoliti, chef at Rei Natura in Serralunga d'Alba (CN), the new restaurant housed inside the Il Boscareto hotel, the great revelation of this year's Red Guide, which has been awarded two prestigious Michelin stars, everything is based on the idea that a dish must tell the identity of the chef but also of the place in which one finds oneself, because whoever sits at the restaurant table must enjoy an all-encompassing and exclusive experience, which cannot be replicated elsewhere, and which therefore has a very strong connection with the valleys and hills of this extraordinary landscape. «Over the years I have understood that to be a good chef you have to have dirt on your hands. I couldn't imagine my kitchen without the vegetable garden, without the greenhouse. I would feel deprived of an important part. It would be like taking away the sense of smell from a nose. I think the vegetable garden and greenhouse are a beautiful metaphor for life. The more you take care of it, the more you receive. I find there is a lot of democracy in this. I learned as a child to take care of the things I cook, thanks to my grandfather. And I refined my knowledge as I grew up, learning from the older ones, from my teachers. The greenhouse is a treasure chest, an infinite palette of varieties to draw from, which changes shades every day, and which is just waiting to be enhanced. Nature will always guide my actions and choices and it couldn't be otherwise. I am the one who is at his service."
At Rei Natura Michelangelo Mammoliti, 35 years old, originally from Giaveno (To), a small town at the foot of the western Alps, where the rhythms dictated by the seasons still have their importance, arrived only two years ago but bringing with him a cultural background of the highest level who takes his first steps in a family where cooking has always played a fundamental role, and will always carry with him a reminder of his traditions, his home, his family. He studied, traveled and met people who changed his way of seeing things. He had the honor of being part of Gualtiero Marchesi's brigade, first at L'Albereta and then at Marchesino; to work alongside Stefano Baiocco, who gave him the impetus that took him to France for five years. Here Alain Ducasse, Pierre Gagnaire, Yannick Alléno and Marc Meneau accustomed him to excellence, rigor and to demanding the most from himself and from those who work alongside him. His acquaintance with Fréderic Lalos, the best bread maker in France, led him to further refine his skills in the white art. It was in France that he learned how to manage a kitchen and understood that the time had come to test himself as an executive chef. Upon his return to Italy in 2014 he held his first position as executive chef and the recognition did not take long to arrive. In 2017 he was awarded the * Michelin Star and only three years later he will reply with the ** Michelin Star. In 2018 he was an Emerging Chef according to the Gambero Rosso Italian Restaurant Guide. In 2021 he is Best Chef of the year according to the Identità Golose Guide and included in The Best Chef Awards. Then he landed at Le Rei Natura where in just two years of work he re-pinned the double Michelin braids on his jacket.
«I have always been convinced that the most intimate memories related to food reside in a remote part of our mind, where they entered at an early age, or perhaps even later in life. However, they all have the same matrix, they are connected to a beautiful moment, which made us feel good and which we will never forget." The chef starts from here to talk about his approach to life even before cooking. Thanks to neurogastronomy, chef Michelangelo Mammoliti wants to revive a distant gustatory memory, a memory, perhaps hidden in the labyrinths of the unconscious, like the flavor of a barbecue on a festive day, or the scent of grandmother's cooking, when she prepared ours favorite recipe; or create a new taste baggage, thanks to new stimuli and new memories, transforming a meal into something more than a gastronomic experience: a true, profound, intimate emotion. You look at the dishes, smell them, chew them, sometimes touch them. And in the end it is the brain that re-elaborates all those inputs and decides where to position a specific ensemble of flavors and suggestions, whether to reserve a place for it in short-term memory, or sculpt it in the deeper cortex. Certainly the dish proposed this week tells a lot about the chef, about his memories but also about the goals of excellence that earned him entry into the elite of the highest Italian cuisine

The recipe for Icterina butter and sage ravioli, extraction of smoked parmesan
Method
• 1500 g microfiltered water
• 100 g parmesan
Light the fire with cherry or apricot wood. Burn the wood until you obtain a constant flame and embers that are not too strong. Smoke the cold parmesan for 10 minutes.
Cool down. Place the Parmesan and water in a vacuum bag. Steam cook at 83°C for 12 hours. Filter the liquid without making it cloudy, in a chinoise with absorbent paper. Reserve in the refrigerator.
Matcha tea green pasta
• 550 g large Pasta Petra
• 200 g of pasteurized egg yolk
• 30 g extra virgin olive oil
• 10 g Matcha tea
• 2 g salt
Place all the ingredients in the planetary mixer. Knead for 5 minutes until the dough is smooth and homogeneous. Store in a vacuum bag with film. Leave to rest in the fridge for 2 hours.
White paste
• 100 g flour
• 50 g microfiltered water
• 10 g pasteurized egg white
• 1 g salt
Place all the ingredients in the planetary mixer. Knead for 5 minutes until the dough is smooth and homogeneous. Store in a vacuum bag with film. Leave to rest in the fridge for 2 hours.
Butter and sage filling
• 250 g butter
• 10 g sage
• 2 g salt
• 1 g pepper
Blend all the ingredients in the Thermomix glass. Sift. Cool down.
Parmesan filling
• 200 g smoked parmesan
• 200 g UHT cream
Blend the cream and smoked parmesan for 10 minutes with a Thermomix.
Finishing
• To taste butter, sage, chicken broth, Icterina sage
Fill one part of the dough with the butter and sage filling and another with the Parmesan filling.
Close the ravioli. Freeze them. Cook them in boiling salted water for 2 minutes. Make a glaze with butter, sage and chicken broth. Arrange on the plate, alternating the ravioli. Finish with Icterina salvia.