I approach Gambero Rosso, a restaurant in the Tuscan coastal town of San Vincenzo, with more than a little trepidation, not because the chef has a reputation for being gruff and autocratic (difficult chefs I can deal with), but because it has been called the best restaurant in Italy. Now, it may well be possible to designate fairly the “best restaurant” in a small town or in a neighborhood that has only a few serious eating places, but when somebody announces that such-and-such is the best restaurant in, say, California or … well, Italy, the statement seems so patently indefensible that I always think, “Oh, grow up!” Anyway, I’m generally allergic to “best restaurants.” They tend to be pretentious and unconscionably expensive; they tend to have attitude. And even if they’re very good, they’re never as good as you somehow expect them to be.
But the evidence in favor of Gambero Rosso is considerable: The celebrated French restaurant critic François Simon, of Le Figaro, calls the Michelin two-star his favorite restaurant in the world. It’s the highest-ranking Italian eating establishment (and “highest climber”) in the current The World’s 50 Best Restaurants, a British website. The two most important dining guides on Italy, Gambero Rosso (no relation) and the Guide de l’Espresso, give it, along with the eccentric Vissani, in the Umbrian town of Baschi, their top scores.
If Gambero Rosso is not better known to American diners, it’s probably because of its location, south of Livorno on the rather ambitiously named Etruscan Riviera. Unless you’re touring the newly prominent wineries of the Maremma (super-Tuscans like Ornellaia and Sassicaia are produced in the region), or perhaps visiting L’Andana, Alain Ducasse’s fantasy version of a Tuscan farm estate, about 35 miles to the southeast of San Vincenzo (see “Tuscany à la Ducasse,” page 42), you’d probably have no reason to be near the place. It’s in Tuscany, sure, but it’s at least a two-hour drive from Florence or the Chianti region, and this particular area has no tourist attractions or luxury hotels.
It probably isn’t because of his restaurant’s relative isolation that Fulvio Pierangelini, chef and co-owner—with his wife, Emanuela—of Gambero Rosso, has been called, in the subtitle of a book about him by journalist Raffaella Prandi, “il grande solista della cucina italiana”—the great soloist of Italian cuisine. And it certainly isn’t because he’s alone in his kitchen: He has a staff of 12 at each service, in addition to himself, to prepare lunches and dinners for a maximum of 24 diners at a time. He is a soloist because, as I am soon to learn, he is a self-taught, intuitive chef who plays by his own rules; he is part of no movement and chases no trends. Molecular gastronomy doesn’t interest him. He just cooks. I’m about to find out how well.
When I walk through the door of Gambero Rosso, Pierangelini is standing there. A ruggedly handsome man with curly, slightly shaggy hair, he does have a touch of the ursine about him—but he seems agreeable enough, and when I mention a mutual friend of ours in Los Angeles, he breaks into a broad smile. As soon as I’ve been shown to my table in the cheery little dining room—it suggests the solarium in a seaside villa—he appears and asks that I allow him to make me a menu. Of course I agree. (Three menus are offered, besides the à la carte dishes—the last of these, “The Grand Menu of Fulvio Pierangelini,” chosen “at the total discretion of the chef.”)
The first thing set in front of me, after a bottle of Gratta-macco Bianco, a barrel-fermented Vermentino from nearby Bolgheri (the wine list here is immense and full of treasures), is a small mound of baccalà—an Italian version of brandade—topped with slices of sandalwood-hued white truffle drizzled with a few drops of olive oil. I eat it in two bites, and almost miss it; then I realize what I’ve just had. The salt cod was delicate and creamy. The truffles weren’t gassy and overwhelming, but tasted earthy and round, leaving a faint glow in the mouth. The oil was buttery and strong but with none of the pepper or leafy bite some Tuscan oils can have (it comes from a nearby farm run by Pierangelini’s son, Fulvietto). Together, they formed a perfect aperitivo, light but pronounced enough in flavor to wake the palate right up.
I pay more attention to the next dish, described on the menu simply as “sandwich di spigola (pesce crudo)”—sandwich of sea bass (raw fish). The uncooked spigola, mild and sweet, has been sliced into translucent sheets, then stacked with wisps of truffle in between, scattered with bits of samphire (a member of the carrot family) and a few perfect baby greens, and dressed with more of that olive oil and some fine, well-aged aceto balsamico tradizionale—which bears as much resemblance to industrial supermarket “balsamic” as Parmigiano-Reggiano does to Velveeta.
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