ITALY
Wine sommelier Vincenzo Donatiello and chef Enrico Crippa are focusing on tea as a connoisseur beverage at the Piazza Duomo Restaurant in Italy’s Piedmont city of Alba.
Donatiello, who manages the 3-star restaurant, has created a menu that pairs tea with dishes conjured up by Crippa. Suggestions include Taiwanese Super Fancy Champagne Oolong with spaghetti and cacio cheese and pepper; Chinese Tai Mu Long Jing green tea with raw fish; Lapsang Souchong with marinated stewed wild boar or Castelmagno cheese; Indian Darjeeling from Dooteriah Estate with crostini and smoked salmon or potato gnocchi with trout and trout roe; classic Earl Grey with apricot tart; Chinese Yu Xue Yunnan green with fusilli, aubergines and ricotta cheese; Bi Luo Chun green with Catalan style scampi; and English Breakfast with grilled sirloin steak.
Piazza Duomo Restaurant is owned by the Ceretto family, well-known Piedmontese wine entrepreneurs and ardent promoters of the local food and wine, and opened in May 2005. It highlights the culture of good living, eating and drinking that has made the Piedmont region unique.
Crippa has collaborated with some of the most famous chefs in Europe and also worked in Japan for three years as executive chef at Gualtiero Marchesi’s restaurant in Kobe and the Rhiga Royal Hotel in Osaka.
Donatiello developed his professional skills in Puglia at the School of Hotel Management of Vieste, was best junior sommelier of Italy in 2004 and best sommelier of Romagna in 2010.
Learn more: www.piazzaduomoalba.it/