Video: Fiore in Rome: the impossible coexistence between vegetarians and carnivores
2024 Author: Cody Thornton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 12:26
Gather peacefully in the same room vegans, vegetarians, raw foodists and also a salami stand, with the inevitable cheeses?
It may seem an impossible, if not dangerous, undertaking, yet a Rome someone seems to have succeeded.
This someone is Massimiliano Valenti, chef of "Fiore, raw and steam", a place recently opened by 4 partners in Via Boncompagni, complete with a regulatory green terrace in full "New York Style".
The idea of the place is almost Franciscan (it seems to be very popular these days), that is to say an idea "of the good and the good".
And if as regards "the good" it is desirable to refer to the flavors of the food proposed, it is not clear whether "the good" concerns the care taken in the preparation of the dishes or the peaceful attempt. coexistence between vegans and carnivores.
In any case, in the restaurant there is really something to please all palates, in an ecumenical banquet. In fact, there is no intolerance, allergy or diet for which a worthy meal is not offered.
Even if, with a view to "everyone can eat", traditionalists are not forgotten, lovers of the classic first, second, side dish and dessert menu (dishes with 14 €) or classic cutting boards (from 9 to 30 €).
In fact, alongside the wide range of smoothies with names of various divinities such as Poseidon, Dionysus, Icarus (7, 50 € if of medium size) and a considerable variety of extracts and centrifuged, vegan and vegetarian salads (10 €), for the followers of the genus, we also find, for example, the "steamed baskets" (15 € the one), rich single dishes cooked in the steam, wedding model of the past.
As for the setting, a flowered terrace apart, the restaurant has a large space where (now inevitable) a central island with an open kitchen, the service is efficient without being suffocating, an element that alone makes you buy a hundred points more to the local.
As for the main element, namely the kitchen, we thoroughly tested the menu, starting immediately with a trio of appetizers - obviously vegan - consisting of an avocado and cucumber tartare (honest), courgette spaghetti with pesto pistachios (notable) and a ravioli, one of red beetroot, which my fellow Neapolitans would classify bluntly as "sapev e poc" (also because, to honor the merit, you can't expect too much from a courgette, a beet and a cucumber, however cleverly combined).
Then, to follow, the raw fish, a rich dish with yellow fin tuna, Mazara shrimp, squid (which inexplicably ended up with some pieces of chewing gum in the guise of squid), amberjack and scallop.
The next dish, the vegetable gazpacho with basil sorbet and wholemeal bread chips, pleasantly surprised us: the sorbet softened the acidity of the vegetable brunoise (celery, cucumber) resulting harmonious on the palate, all served at low temperatures that they gave an extra gear.
But so far, you will have understood, we have obviously joked.
We started to get serious with the tagliolino cacio e pepe with bacon and dark red onion, which could easily have been called by its name, aka pasta alla gricia and which could have done without the pasty tagliolino in favor of a more consistent spaghetti.
Either way, an honest dish as a whole.
Then, the sea bass with fine herbs with smoked potato, celery and green apple allowed us to enjoy a sweet, light and particular dish, thanks also to the light smoke and the sour note of the apple, which gave the dish an interesting balance.
We ended up with the most classic dessert, Tiramisu, declined in the house version, that is to say with ice cream. Good, nothing to say, but we still have to understand what ice cream has to do, moreover at freezing temperatures, with the national dessert, and above all if it would not be worth it to offer the dessert in its soft and creamy traditional version, perhaps providing in addition another dessert based only on ice cream.
To sum up, a place with a great variety of dishes and cuisines (all good, all slightly impersonal), to be experienced also on the large terrace overlooking the green cultivated herbs that gives that extra "something" of relaxation to your meal.
It will serve vegetarians to save themselves from dangerous temptations such as national and Iberian cured meats, Italian or French cheeses.
It will be used by carnivores to alleviate the feelings of guilt induced by plateau de fruit, salads, centrifuged and smoothies with plant milk.
Provided that both, vegetarians and carnivores, accept coexistence.
Flower, Raw and Steam
Via Boncompagni 31
Rome
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