Italian fare and festivities

It is impossible to think about Italy without thinking of the country’s delicious fare.

The kitchen is central to the hearts and minds of Italian families and, with that in mind, one of the island’s top restaurants is staging an Italian Gastronomic and Cultural Festival until Friday.

A celebration of Italian food and culture got underway at the Sofitel Bahrain Zallaq Thalassa Sea & Spa last Wednesday.

Several diplomats and dignitaries attended including Bahrain’s Italian ambassador, Enrico Padula, appearing at one of his last engagements in the kingdom before taking up a post in the Canadian city of Montreal.

Festival Italiano is being staged in the hotel’s Fiamma Restaurant and guests are being taken on an Italian journey with authentic Venetian dishes as well as performances by renowned Italian entertainers, tenor Vincenzo Sanzo and soprano Carla Mazzarella.

There is also an exhibition showcasing the work of Bahrain-based Italian photographer Loredana Mantello.

The entertainment is first class. Although non-Italian guests on the opening night may not understand the words, everyone appreciates those operatic classics made famous by the late, great Luciano Pavarotti.

Celebrity beyond the world of opera came to Pavarotti at the 1990 World Cup in Italy with performances of Puccini’s Nessun dorma, from Turandot, and as one of The Three Tenors in their famed first concert held on the eve of the tournament’s final match.

He sang on that occasion with fellow star tenors Plácido Domingo and José Carreras, bringing opera to a wider audience.

Vincenzo, without the aid of a microphone, gave a touch of his soul to the proceedings and even had the kitchen staff sneaking out from behind the pots and pans for a glimpse of his majestic performance.

The kitchen team deserved a standing ovation too for dishing up some amazing delights, led by Italian Chef De Cuisine Stefano Tansini, who had been working behind the scenes from 5am to ensure the cuisine was exquisite on the night.

Chef Tansini, 34, trained in Tuscany and in some of the finest restaurants around Lake Major in northern Italy where he comes from and even ran his own restaurant in the north east city of Newcastle in England before being snapped up by Sofitel and moving to the Middle East.

He said: “One of the main highlights of the kitchen is that many of our ingredients come directly from Italy to the hotel.

“Variety is the spice of life in Italy and each region has its own specialties, which we like to bring to the table. I also like to add a special twist to some of the traditional dishes.”

The pasta station offered a choice of gnocchi, penne, tagliatelle and Ravioli with a selection of sauces to choose from including sage, pesto, cherry tomato and creamy garlic. The pizza was also perfect.

Other dishes included chicken cacciatore, sea bream with lemon and caper, brasata which looked like a meaty stew, and outside on the veranda were live cooking stations dishing up pieces of lamb, steaks and giant prawns.

There is an Italian proverb with reads ‘mangiare per vivere e non vivere per mangiare’ which translated means: eat to live and not live to eat.

This week Chef Tansini and his team are proving the point.