«I have never liked prejudices! I prefer to touch reality first hand, understand, let myself be intrigued, like Calabria. I recognized it in my wife’s heart, in her deep bond with Praia and Dino Island and my daughters, who learned to swim and grow in this sea. Returning to the extreme tip of the country in November is like touching a land that enters on tiptoe, welcomes you in silence, looks you in the eye in its authenticity: Reggio Calabria.” These beautiful words are written on his Facebook and Instagram profiles by Alessandro Borghese, a chef much loved by Italians – whose wife, the supermanager Wilma Oliverio, grew up in Calabria – who is filming an episode of one of the most popular and successful formats of “taste TV”, a much appreciated and followed reality show on the banks of the Strait: “4 restaurants”, broadcast on Sky and now in its tenth season.
Chef Borghese, who will visit four restaurants in Reggio vying to win the episode – dining in each together with the other competing restaurateurs, who will assign each other votes on location, service, menu, bill and “special dish” – spoke of the Lungomare, of the Aragonese Castle, obviously of the Bronzes “guardians of a beauty that knows no time”, but also of the flavors of Reggio and Calabrian cuisine: “The flavours, which become story. The bergamot tastes like the sun, the ‘nduja lights up your smile, the “swordfish alla ghiotta”: tomato, olives, capers and all the sea inside». Which makes us think that perhaps the challenge will be on traditional seafood dishes from Reggio.