Tucci’s Italian feast for the King made with British ingredients (apart from one)
From Yorkshire pecorino to the King’s own sparkling wine, it will be an Italian meal with uniquely British flavours. Just don’t mention the olive oil.
As the King hosts a dinner on Friday evening to celebrate Anglo-Italian relations, he will champion the importance of homegrown, seasonal British produce.
The menu, designed by Stanley Tucci, the actor, and Francesco Mazzei, a Calabrian chef, is a masterclass in culinary diplomacy.
While each course is traditionally Italian, almost every ingredient has been produced in Britain, painstakingly sourced over many months from Scotland to Somerset.
But despite his admirable effort to use 100 per cent British ingredients, Mazzei was eventually granted one small nod to his homeland.
“The only Italian item I am allowed to use is Farchioni olive oil,” he admitted. “I couldn’t find that here.. I did find some olive oil from, I think Essex, but I didn’t really like it.”
The event comes ahead of the King and Queen’s state visit to Italy and the Vatican in early April, when they will undertake engagements in Rome and the north-eastern city of Ravenna, known for its early Christian mosaic artwork, Buckingham Palace has announced.
The couple will meet Pope Francis at the Vatican and celebrate the Catholic Church’s Pilgrims of Hope jubilee year, attending the Holy See, the government of the Roman Catholic Church.
The spring tour, which will coincide with their 20th wedding anniversary, will be their third official EU tour in almost two years and is designed to strengthen ties post-Brexit.
In the lead-up to the trip, the Italian-themed black tie dinner at Highgrove, the King’s Gloucestershire home, will celebrate slow food and slow fashion, movements that promote quality and sustainability.
Among the 80 guests will be Inigo Lambertini, the Italian ambassador to the UK, and Carlo Petrino, a food writer who founded the Slow Food movement in Italy in 1986 after taking exception to the opening of a McDonald’s in Rome’s Piazza di Spagna.
Tucci, who is American-Italian and known for his gastronomic travelogue Searching for Italy, will give a speech.
The idea for the event came after the King met Lambertini, who was “very struck” by his passion for the slow food philosophy.
The monarch personally requested Tucci’s involvement, having met him at a King’s Trust event, and the actor wasted no time in enlisting the services of his good friend Mazzei, who catered his wedding to the literary agent Felicity Blunt, the sister of actress Emily Blunt, in 2012.
Slow food and fashion are two areas central to the work of the King’s Foundation, which uses its base at Highgrove to offer training programmes and workshops in heritage and crafts that the monarch fears are at risk of being lost to future generations.
At a pre-dinner reception, the King and Queen will mingle with students and graduates who will demonstrate skills such as millinery, embroidery, furniture making and fashion design.
Mazzei, once described as “arguably one of the world’s greatest Italian chefs”, admitted that designing an Italian menu using solely British produce was not entirely plain sailing.
Certain dishes were off the table, either because they are not in season or could not be found in the UK. Rocket was switched for watercress, while a planned risotto was replaced with ravioli due to the lack of British-grown risotto rice. Blood oranges were also taken off the menu.
But over the course of his travels up and down the country, Mazzei discovered some British gems that left him “blown away”.
“To create an Italian menu, with truly Italian flavour but with 99 per cent British produce, was fun and challenging in some aspects,” he told The Telegraph. “It’s been a fantastic learning curve and has really opened my mind.”
He was fascinated to discover Yorkshire-made pecorino, which will make an appearance in his cheese puff canapes, while the starter will include an “absolutely beautiful” panzanella salad with Scottish crab.
The ravioli will be made using Westcombe Somerset ricotta, Highgrove fine herbs and a white tomato passata.
The 00 flour is from the Cotswolds-based Shipton Mill and the walnuts used to make the biscotti were sourced from a Kent farm.
For the main course, porchetta, made with Suffolk Red pork, will be served with Kent-grown Tuscan kale and squash. The Pink Fir potatoes and sturon onions were harvested at Highgrove last year.
His chosen pudding is a classic Italian dish, zuppa inglese.
“It’s English soup, but it’s nothing to do with England and it’s nothing to do with soup,” Mazzei said.
“It’s one of the most popular Italian desserts along with tiramisu. “It’s basically a creme custard, a sponge with a liquor called Alchermes, and a chocolate mousse on top... It reminds me a bit of trifle, with no fruit.”
The Alchermes will be switched for an English liquor.
As for the wine, the King’s own Highgrove sparkling will be served before dinner while the rest of the meal will be accompanied by “iconic” Italian wines.
“We couldn’t really go better than that,” Mazzei said. “But the Highgrove sparkling was very, very good.”
The drinks will be prepared by Italian mixologist Alessandro Palazzi, using Italian flavours and herbs from Charles’s beloved Highgrove Gardens.
‘Mamma’s cooking with a chef’s hands’
Mazzei, who describes his food as “Mamma’s cooking with a chef’s hands”, is currently in residency at Villa Corinthia, Corinthia Palace, in Malta.
The Highgrove event will be the first time he has cooked for the King, prompting him to joke: “No pressure at all!”
But he added: “It’s a great honour, it will probably be one of the best things I’ve done in my career. It makes me proud. It will be a great night and I’m looking forward to it.”
A spokesman for the Italian embassy said: “As a country we are very proud of our ‘Made in Italy’ tradition and absolutely proud Their Majesties are fans.
“It sends a very important message to put slow food and slow fashion, the Italian way of doing things, centre stage. We have chosen a chef who is 100 per cent Italian and he’s done an incredible job to ensure we have something very British and very Italian at the same time.”
