APR.MAG 2014
VI
AT PAGE 16
The burger
becomes gourmet
It is the phenomenon of the
moment and the undisputed
star of the fast food moves
through the vast territory of the
restoration, also the high level
one, helped by the spread of
local theme.
By Pietro Cinti
The burger is one of the food fads of
the moment. Anyway, forget about the
80s, paninari, their bizarre clothing
and neologisms that have characterized
Anglo- maccheronici that short season
now consigned to memory. Today, after
30 years of fast food chains in stars and
stripes, with standardized quality down,
calories and sugar galore and many
doubts about the origin of the common
man and the healthiness of what ends
up between two slices of bread those
premises, all equal to each other, today
the hamburger gets back into a new
dimension, which collects ideas and
suggestions from high international
food, it feeds the media overexposure
of chefs and starred various becomes
the medium through which to transfer
to a wide audience research concepts
such as raw material, biological,
maximum freedom in creating new
recipes, including ethnic and localism
pushed. In two words, we talk about the
gourmet burgers.
BEST ITALIAN. In the beginning there
was a “paninari “ in New York who
invented the world’s most expensive
burger, stuffed with foie gras and caviar:
it was in 2000, the global economic
crisis was a ghost to come, he starts
running towards the world market the
most expensive, the most conspicuous.
A long time later, at our latitude, the
gourmet burgers made his debut in Italy
when Gualtiero Marchesi, the national
icon of the great culinary tradition, he
signed a sandwich for the multinational
McDonald’s hamburger, by clearing the
union, considered heretical only a few
years earlier, rank among chefs and
burgers. From then on it was a hive
of creations by members of the new
wave culinary tricolor: everyone put
between two slices of bread its own
essence, its own philosophy. So that a
book called “Italian Hamburger “ was
published, which collects recipes and
a foreword by Joe Bastianich, with one
of his terse sentences: “Italy is the only
country capable of doing justice to the
hamburger.”
TODAY MILAN IS THE CAPITAL OF
Italian Burger, also in gourmet version.
“It is the most cosmopolitan city in Italy
- declares Massimo Sassi, the owner of
the Lombard Agency - and it is open
to many influences of different food
traditions from around the world, maybe
because our cuisine has not survived.”
Agenzia Lombarda since 1929 provides
wholesale food -go for the channel, so it
is a vantage point for understanding the
new trends on the square of Milan. “The
gourmet burgers - continues Sassi - is a
growing phenomenon, perhaps the last
space of a few seasons, but is giving a
breath of fresh air in the city. We sell
these to the locals the American meat,
in particular sottofesa of black angus,
which is perfect for this recipe, because
it is fat, and therefore more tender
and tasty. Some of our customers are
provided with professional meat grinder
and grind with those every day and
prepare fresh burgers, so they can vary
the cuts and flavoring. Although a bit ‘
challenging, that of professional meat
grinder is an investment that quickly
pays for itself.”
The SUCCESS FACTORS: There are
many gourmet burgers. Some relate
to the offering of these premises,
pointing out meat from special breeds
(quinine, fassona, limousines), animals,
according to the dictates of organic
farming, artisan breads, sauces and
self-produced fresh vegetables, often at
zero kilometers, cheese high quality.
The combination is preferred with
craft beer, maybe Italian, although
some local link also good bottles of
wine. Bandits ketchup, mayonnaise,
soft multinationals drinks, everything
is reviewed with a view gourmet and
tailor-made. Another feature, the table
service, here present and absent at the
premises of large multinational chains
of the sandwich. Common fast food
and gourmet sandwich the pleasure of
eating with your hands, in an informal
way and the target, even if the price
difference (the gourmet burgers ranging
from 8 to over 20 € ) “select “ customers.
The restaurant
Mucche e Buoi: the meat is at home.
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