Italian chef behind ‘best roast chicken ever’ almost became a computer engineer
- Giuseppe Iannotti, owner and executive chef of one-Michelin-starred Krèsios, in Italy, made his first meal aged six
- He talks about his playful approach to flavours and why he loves cooking Chinese food
Tell us about your childhood. “I learned the importance of the quality of food when I was very young. My family has a farm [in Telese Terme, in southwestern Italy’s Campania region] and we made salami, jam and marmalade; we ate vegetables from the garden; we raised chickens, rabbits, turkeys, pigeons and lambs. I didn’t drink milk from a carton until I was six years old; up until then I had drunk fresh milk from a cow.”
What was the first dish you cooked? “When I was six, I made my first lunch. My mum was not well so I asked her to tell me what to do. I made fresh pasta with ragu sauce. I usually would help my mum to prepare the ragu and we used the meat my father gave us. We have our own traditional recipe. My mum gave me a tip: test the sauce with bread. If it tastes good with bread, then it’s good with pasta.”
How did you get into computer engineering? “When I was young, my father brought my younger brother, Roberto, and me to the farm to make us understand why we must go to school. My father is a farmer who has five hectares to grow grapes to sell to winemakers. He said school helps you to decide your job.
“In college I studied computer engineering. I loved studying and I liked computer engineering, so I did well academically. But I decided to quit it when I was 23 – because my friend graduated with the same major and his salary was only €500 a month. With cooking I can make that much in two days. I believe with my passion I can have a good business. For me, a recipe is like software. The definition of software is a sequence, a limited number of steps that arrive at a result. A recipe is like software that finishes with food that, we hope, tastes good.”
I make 35 courses for each menu, each course is one or two bites because I want to try different foods, I want to play with food and I want the guest to have new experiences
How did you start your restaurant, Krèsios? “When I was 23, I signed a lease for a space in a nearby village called Castelvenere that has only 1,000 people. I wanted to try my idea about food and service to understand the restaurant business. I got a bank loan of €25,000 and started the restaurant, buying ingredients, tableware and furniture. Later, I went to my father and said I wanted to renovate the farmhouse so I could move the restaurant there [in 2011].
“My parents live upstairs and the ground floor is the restaurant, and there is a wine cellar and test kitchen in the basement. The test kitchen has many technological gadgets like ultrasonic instruments, a distilling machine, food dehydrator, liquid nitrogen and fermentation devices to make things like kombucha.”