On the (mozzarella) roads

The ingredients are all present: the best mozzarella in the world, naturally, but also Gragnano pasta, tomato, pizza. Even the sea is present – a few steps from the new location, that is to say the Savoy Beach Hotel – and so is culture, with the fascinating remains of Magna Grecia. The congress dedicated to buffalo milk mozzarella organised by BG Consulting in collaboration with Consorzio della Mozzarella di Bufala Campana Dop could sound almost like an excuse to leave straight away and spend some time over here.

Instead, even this year Barbara Guerra and Albert Sapere have been committed in finalising a programme so intense and rich in novelties that once again one will need to leave the beach behind and make-do with a short visit to the temples – without neglecting mozzarella, no one would do that – not to miss even a minute of the rich programme that was presented on Wednesday April 23rd inside Hotel Hassler’s Palazzetto in Rome. As many as 50 chefs have been asked to take the difficult challenge of interpreting a product that is so good it calls to be eaten just the way it is. Except if... someone doesn’t prove the contrary.

The exception and the rule is the theme chosen for the 7th Edition of the festival: discussions regarding quality and food sustainability, the experience of artisans, farmers, chefs, will have the objective of “questioning oneself and looking for the answers through a careful analysis, putting pre-packaged and apathetic thoughts aside” creating a direct link with the words that were pronounced, last year, by Corrado Assenza: “work is necessary to escape the boring, daily routine, every day”.

Here are the novelties and some of the people participating, including emerging young chefs and world famous ones. Beside the congress itself, which this year will host even international chefs such as Quique Dacosta, Josean Alija, Jean-Francois Piege and Sardinian-Parisian Simone Tondo next to numerous Italian chefs – from Aprea to Uliassi – there will be three Ateliers dedicated Pizza and Leavened products, Mozzarella and Made in Italy (from breakfast to ice-cream) and Pasta Muzzarella e Pummarola, in collaboration with Luigi Cremona’s Emergente, which will bring some young and promising chefs on stage, who will tackle some of the emblematic ingredients of the gastronomic district of Campania, one of the most appreciated in the world.

“We’ve decided to add some more technical meetings to the congress, in which chefs can express ideas on cooking and mozzarella, as well as present their dishes. The cooking shows within the Ateliers will be mostly an opportunity for chefs and public, the latter composed of experts, professionals and enthusiasts, to share and interact” Barbara Guerra explains. Even wine will have its space, with the traditional Looking for White tastings guided by Luciano Pignataro in search of the ideal white wine for buffalo milk mozzarella, and the vertical tasting of Bellavista.

The events focusing on pizza, not only the Neapolitan-style one, are also not to be missed: besides the great interpreters of Neapolitan tradition such as Gino Sorbillo, Salvatore and Francesco Salvo, Gianfranco Iervolino, Franco Pepe and Ciro Salvo, in the Atelier one will also find Maria Cacialli and Ciro Oliva’s fried pizza and the baking-tin pizza by Bonci, Giuseppe Giordano’s Pizz'ino, Alfonso Pepe’s panettone, Agostino Iacobucci’s babà and Salvatore La Ragione’s restaurant breads. In other words, the countdown has begun and we’re ready to get travelling, once again, on the Roads of Mozzarella.