Massimo Bottura, visionary chef and owner of the three-Michelin-starred Osteria Francescana, is one of the few culinary masters to revolutionize Italian cuisine.
With an innovative approach to the country’s most classic dishes, Bottura’s conceptual creations have not only ranked his restaurant among the most productive in the world, but also made him a global advocate for the industry as a whole.
“The accomplishments mean a lot to me. They also mean we worked very hard. This is my life,” says Bottura. “This has always been my dream to bring people to Modena and share the unique charm and world class ingredients—but it isn’t about me anymore. It is about the next generation. Lara and I with the restaurants, Casa Maria Luigia and the Acetaia are building the foundation for more generations to discover Modena.”
Opened by Bottura and his wife, Lara Gilmore, in 2019, Casa Maria Luigia is an idyllic 18th-century guesthouse nestled in the picturesque countryside of Emilia-Romagna (birthplace of Ferrari, Maserati and Parmigiano Reggiano, to name a few highlights). Naturally, the food is the attraction.
“When I met Massimo in 1993 in New York, he was already talking about Michelin stars,” Gilmore says. “In a small city like Modena, it took years to be identified and accepted for the fresh cuisines we showcased. It sounds easy today, but all those years have helped us put down deep roots, build a network, and a culture of innovation and leadership.
“Casa Maria Luigia is the most complex and complete commission because there are so many pieces of painting that they all have to align with the paintings. “
This includes educating other people about the property, which they have now done in the most Bottura way possible.
Following the bestselling Never Trust a Skinny Italian Chef (2014) and Bread is Gold (2017), Bottura and Gilmore partnered up to write Slow Food, Fast Cars—a cookbook-cum-tourism guide inviting readers to experience the honest food, unique design, and exceptional hospitality of Casa Maria Luigia.
With contributions from Chef Jessica Rosval, the e-book features a collection of 85 recipes from the guest house’s Emilian cuisine. Think frittatas and focaccia, pastries and pastries, jams and preserves, drinks and liqueurs, as well as a variety of inspiring fish, meats and vegetable dishes as well as tons of facts about their regional origins and ingredients.
“‘Slow food’ is a container for the artisanal ingredients and traditional recipes that are a part of the identity of Emilia-Romagna,” says Bottura. “Parmigiano Reggiano is a great example—a raw milk cheese which is be aged for minimum of 24 months before it is released to the public. It can also be aged longer, for 30, 36, 40 and even 50 months.
Breakfast at Casa Maria Luigia. Photograph by Michael Gardenia (pages 16-17 of Slow Food, FastArray. . . [ ] Cars)
“When you put the two concepts together (slow food and fast cars), I’m talking about a dish I started making 30 years ago and still serve today: the five ages of parmigiano reggiano,” says Bottura. “It’s about celebrating the slow passage of time with a fast and fresh spirit. Without strategy and technology, this dish would never have existed, nor without the culture of artisan cheese. Today, it is as fresh, if not more so, that it makes thirty years. “
Such contradictions, Gilmore says, are part of the couple’s DNA. “The imaginary and the genuine are a little slow and fast. That’s how Massimo and I work. We live in a dream state, imagining and letting our fantasies take over until the last minute, when we are forced to face the truth and make decisions like ‘Here’s the menu, the couch goes here, there are 12 rooms and the wall is blue. . . ‘
Born and raised in Modena, Bottura grew up with his grandmother, Ancella, making vinegar in under the roof beams of their family home. “It filled up the stairwell with that sweet and acidic smell that reminds me of her and my childhood,” he remembers. “I do feel like my bones are made of Parmigiano and my blood is Balsamic. These traditions help us know where we come from and who we are.”
It’s not just about preserving those ingredients, but also about keeping them contemporary. At Casa Maria Luigia, each and every guest will find bursts of Parmigiano Reggiano and Lambrusco in their room, as the owners need this to be part of the estate’s energy. the beginning.
“It is a pleasure to share the balsamic production and invite our visitors to see before their eyes the quiet and intimate time that passes. Adding this feature, which was included in the assets but was only ours last year, completed the picture,” says Gilmore. “When I first met Massimo, he talked about balsamic vinegar as if it were running through his veins. Now, in a way, it is!
Massimo Bottura and Lara Gilmore
The pair are also incredibly helpful to chef Jessica Rosval’s contributions to the project. Like Gilmore, Rosval is an American who moved to Italy to pursue her culinary and adjacent culinary dreams.
“She and I see things that Massimo or other Italians who grew up here,” Gilmore says. “We see the hidden gems, the treasure in the haystack, and we need our visitors to ‘get’ it and perceive how we fell in love with the culture of this place. “
Bottura, too, speaks of the imperative importance of having many cooks in the proverbial kitchen. “I always say ‘alone, I am Massimo Bottura, together, we are Osteria Francescana’.
“In that same way, ‘together, we are Casa Maria Luigia. Together we can make dreams come true. It is all about working together, learning and growing together, and never stop dreaming. It’s all about not accepting to stand still but moving forward. In my future there is more future,” says Bottura.
Homemade Sweets: Roses with Lemongrass (page 173 of Slow Food, Fast Cars)
Still, it’s not all about restaurants, cookbooks, and luxury escape. After the Refettorio Ambrosiano in 2015, Bottura founded Food for Soul—a global non-profit which focuses on local partnerships to bring healthy meals to people in need while fighting food waste. “The most important thing I have ever done was opening the first Refettorio in Milan. My life changed after that–and my kitchen too!” says Bottura.
While the organization remains very true to its heyday of slow food and fast cars, Food for Soul already has twelve projects, the most recent of which have opened in San Francisco and Harlem.
“It also allows us to stay focused on our long-term dreams. We never stop thinking about what we can become one day, as Joseph Beuys says: never stop planting,” Gilmore explains. “That’s really what we do. This popularity is helping us make anything possible. But it’s the difficult paintings that get you there.
With this in mind, the pair also launched Tortellante in 2016—a local, Modena-focused project offering culinary work to young people on the autistic spectrum.
“We began in 2016 teaching young people how to make tortellini and today we have a pasta lab that produces tortellini for many of our restaurants in Modena,” says Gilmore.
His son, Charlie, works at Tortellante and at the new bottega: a small shop that promotes tortellini, cakes and local products. “This is another opportunity for those talented young people to grow and join the network and he is very proud. to bring their own magic to the Francescana family. “
And they probably wouldn’t stop there. Are you already on Bottura and Gilmore’s endless list of things to do at Casa Maria Luigia?Eight more bedrooms, more common areas, more gardens and a small cooking school for 6-8 people.
“There’s something else to dream about. If we avoid dreaming, we have nothing,” says Bottura. “Maybe one day I’ll stop running and write an e-book of my memoirs. For now, I’m still thinking fast and cooking slowly.