"The young Mexican chef has skilfully put into practice the lesson learnt from Massimo Bottura. She applies technique and ideas from all around the world to an historical Italian format: the osteria. She does so in a place that, like few others in Italy, joins beauty and goodness".
This is the reason the Guida Identità Golose 2019 gave when giving the Best Female Chefaward to Karime Lopez: a brilliant decision, because this young woman born in 1982 in Mexico City, with her curriculum, her life choices and her training is the perfect representation of Italy as a country with strong roots, but open.
Lopez is a jewel that shines even more thanks to the many experiences she acquired before arriving in Italy. At 19, after high school, she went to Paris to study art, and then decided to move to Spain: «When I saw the restaurants and the pastry-shops in Paris, I realised that cooking could be a form of art. So I decided to change my career». From that moment on, she never stopped. The important 5-year experience as sous-chef at Central in Lima, Peru, with Virgilio Martinez, was only the latest leg of a long journey: Can Fabes in Catalonia – where she trained as chef – then Mugaritz in San Sebastian, Pujol in Mexico City, RyuGin in Tokyo. Finally, Osteria Francescana, having arrived in Italy also because in the meantime she had married Takahiko Kondo, Bottura’s sous-chef.
So on January 9th 2018, when the kitchen at Gucci Osteria da Massimo Bottura in Florence first started to work, she was the person behind the stove: «What I appreciated the most in Bottura is that he gives confidence to his collaborators. It’s nice when such an important chef tells you: "I trust you"».
She uses Italian ingredients adding influences from all around the world: «It’s a fun journey, the sum of Massimo’s lessons, of the experiences the team members have acquired abroad, and the flavours of the excellent products Italy can offer».
