Come in, come in, take a seat, it’s a modest stable, this is the recovery stable, on the land of the town there are practically pigs here, there are three other animals, even the fodder, the food and everything else comes from our land, I mean that what we have around here We use manure and reuse it as fertilizer for the land, let’s say it is a simple but also automatic balance, without forcing it because it is all natural. It has always been done this way so it belongs to our land, it belongs to our habits, more than anything even the pigs eat what we eat, in fact we raise the pig as we once did in Sant’Antonio Abate, our patron saint Sant’Antonio abbot is known for the night of the bells, practically in the abbey where the brotherhood was there were these little pigs that went around the town with the bells when people heard these bells they were already preparing the food that they had to give to these pigs in a certain without it it was the town that raised pigs and then slaughtered them at the end of the year, it was a little good for the whole population, including monks and friars, I mean this natural thing that has always been there belongs not only to our town but to the towns in our territory, I repeat, it is simple and natural, it is a balance that must exist and there must be that we absolutely must not lose here, just to understand, it is my father’s land, so to speak, it is practically a recovery, they were the old shutters, where the Innkeeper and the Pig was born, but before there was Sapori e Vino and we are practically recovering all the remains, like the iron with which we made the base with the plastic drawers, you see. this was an old shutter that we transformed into kennels for the chickens where they go to lay eggs, where they go to brood on the other side we have some coves then if you come to visit us I’ll show you we also have goats on the other side, rabbits and everything else now let’s go to the kitchen and make the "poor man’s" omelette, the spontaneous structure is what the hen was, a farmyard animal, it should even be rewritten in the dictionary because the hen is an animal that scratches, unfortunately it doesn’t there are more chicken farms, which were considered as aggregators of the courtyard, where everyone knew where to go to find the eggs, therefore a large family used the eggs and prepared this omelette where you could put anything, my grandfather also said the grass, the one they used, now let’s go inside and do this thing , then I’ll tell you a little story about what this hen aggregator was, a farmyard animal, a free-roaming animal, even if unfortunately it’s no longer like that, let’s go to the kitchen Good evening, can we ask you to tell us your story. Good evening to you, eh, my story would take another life than what I have, like the life of everyone, let’s say it wasn’t simple? Absolutely not, in my opinion it’s very simple also because let’s say that due to the character I have which I then discover also through my father’s look backwards and my son’s look forwards which is a bit of a family fact that we have the so-called gene eh therefore this situation of this availability at times even a little excessive towards others towards other people is therefore a propensity that we are familiar with. The fact that if someone makes a request to us, we make ourselves available is a fact let’s say so and in everything this let’s say that my father is the first radio technician in Montoro we are in Montoro in the province of Avellino and the first technician in Montoro so at the time there was the doctor of the people, and my father was the doctor of televisions, household appliances so dad I, together with my father, entered almost all the houses, I certainly came later because I arrived later, when I was born in 71 my father already had a business, a workshop fixed these televisions, various household appliances, etc., then gradually I grown up here I am someone who talks a lot, in fact my primary school teacher, teacher Mena, who I can say is my second mother still alive today, eh she told me you eat the radios because I talked a lot and I practically found myself in this project thanks to my wife’s family who I have known since 1986-87 when I arrived here from San Pietro in this hamlet called Caliano where the patron saint is Sant’Antonio Abate I know this girl, owner of a pizzeria here in Caliano right in this country where, between various situations, I have become a bit passionate about what the world of eating can be but I mean we have always been passionate, eh my grandfather was a farmer and had the land, the animals so we have always been like family a bit those of good food, we have always liked buying good things in the best places, we have never been satisfied, in the sense that we have always done a bit of research, this is also clear from my size, I don’t owe you hide that I am definitely not someone who dies of hunger, as you can understand and see I have always liked to eat, basically I became passionate about it also through getting to know all my grandparents even my wife’s grandparents, each of them has me left something behind, for example I started slaughtering and growing pigs because my wife’s grandfather was a butcher, the fact is that I am a good gourmet, I look for what I like in taste, I am not interested in reputation, in fact I am a bit ‘ I’m against commercial products because I always say it’s not that we call that thing one way, we put it in our mouth and the flag comes out on our head, all this isn’t there, it doesn’t have to be beautiful only to the ear, surely, even the The ear plays its part just as the eye does its part, but taste is an important thing so the Oste il Porco project was born from here, the name represents my physical size partly due to the fact of the pig but also for the history that I had in the celebrations of the community of Sant’Antonio Abate, I was the advocate of bringing hot air balloons to Montoro, I did many torchlight processions for many years, more than 20 and therefore this person to have a little confidence with us who were younger, I who was always big was called the black pig of San Antonio, no then I mean, a bit of this thing, a bit of the fact of the pig that I suddenly started practically butchering in a method that is also a bit all my own, because we also do this with my cousin but he knows that I have a somewhat my own situation regarding pig slaughter, as they say in pork jargon, nothing is thrown away, as in our kitchen nothing is thrown away, we make a circular kitchen which I will explain to you later and nothing so by host we mean the person who gives hospitality, the person who looks for you, I mean not only here is the eating but the music, feeling good, the environment, what you look at, trying to create something that is good for those who visit it, let’s say it’s the one who welcomes you, gives for a moment the basis of what the structure is, what can be tranquility, harmony, hospitality, familiarity, unfortunately these are things that gradually begin to wobble, but I mean we don’t give up also because there is nothing to give up this is our life and our dimension and so let’s move forward towards this modus, let’s say this way of looking at food and looking at l’Oste e il Porco does the name of the restaurant l’Oste Il Porco have a particular meaning for you? well so much detail but how simple here could be called the innkeeper the pig perhaps, the innkeeper and the pig because in a moment calling the pig a pig or the pig a pig is a little more compromising just as you were saying also how it sounds in a in a certain sense, let’s say that he is a little more strange if we want to call him that because I mean with a different sound, a different phonetics. The fact of communicating, I mean, apart from the phonetics, is a modality, the Innkeeper is the person who he gives hospitality, that’s what I mean, he welcomes the people he’s looking for, he tries to make people feel good but with a series of researches that aren’t just the culinary ones but are the musical ones, the environment, the sitting, what you look at with the eyes what one hears with the ears, the scents, the familiarity, the hospitality, are things on the order of the moment for us, it is in our life it is part of our living modus From the structure or rather from the company Flavors and wine the project was born the innkeeper the pig, the name represents my physical size partly due to the fact of the pig but also because the story that I had in the celebrations of the community of Sant’Antonio Abate, I was the advocate of bringing hot air balloons to Montoro, I did many torchlight processions for many years, more than 20 and therefore this person to have a little confidence with we who were younger , I who was always big was called the black pig of Sant’Antonio, no then I mean, a bit of this thing, a bit of the fact of the pig that suddenly the innkeeper is that person who it gives hospitality, the person who looks for you, I mean not only the food but the music, the feeling of well-being, the environment, what you look at, trying to create something that is good for those who come to visit it, let’s say he is the one who welcomes, gives for a moment the basis of what the structure is, what can be tranquility, harmony, hospitality, familiarity, unfortunately these are things that gradually begin to wobble, however I mean we don’t give up also because there is nothing to give up this is our life it is our dimension and therefore we move forward towards this modus, let’s say this way of looking at food and of looking at the Innkeeper and the Pig talking instead of sustainability issues, environmental impact and let’s say reuse of waste, this is a fairly important issue but for a moment it affects everything that is the communication structure more than anything else, it’s a moment where we talk about what is the overheating of the planet, that everyone is trying to get rid of plastic, as with plastic cups replacing them with paper ones, improving cars with electric ones replacing the classic use of diesel or petrol. A series of things, I say that there is a need for much more simplicity in all of this, it doesn’t have to be an engineered situation, I believe that there is a need to feel it inside and to simply understand that the world is something that is lent to us and something that is not given to us it belongs, it belongs to us in our life span that sooner or later, either me or you or whoever it is will have to go away, many say when as late as possible, oh well one hopes I mean whatever may be longer, but many say what the gentleman wants, but truly with simplicity regarding what our kitchen is, we make a circular kitchen, let’s say that there are these grandparents who I showed you through the sweater in Scizzo earlier, this grandmother who is absolutely not for case in this box above, near Santa Claus but the highest part of the room, a female matriarch, mother of 12 children where during the war she practically had to bend over backwards to be able to make people feel good or rather make people live these kids, these children, these 12 children she had in a short time, so she found herself with a myriad of children and she was exactly the person who got angry when something was thrown away, it was like the devil, a series of things, for us in sustainability it’s an important thing, circular cuisine leads us to use various elements, for example one of the strong characteristics of this company is bread, for example, we use it in all its ways, but here it comes from the flours of this grain, therefore the meatball , made like grandma made it, grandma bruised this meatball because she said that there was little oil in the pan and while she was explaining this she said yes but in the meatball the meat is only needed for the smell, that is, she was explaining to you that if there is no ‘it was the oil, let alone the meat, we put the bread in the poor man’s omelette or the cooked bread, we really care a lot about this type of situation but to say the bread which is found in every house can be an element of recovery, but a recovery element can be vegetables, that is, from what can be fennel to what can be cabbage, cauliflower, even potatoes, which if processed in all simplicity and tranquility, I mean, nothing of it is thrown away nothing, it’s not like the potato peel is anything something that is not good, regarding what plastics can be, what all polluting matter can be, we try to avoid using these things or if we have them we try to reuse them, even in a different way, I want say so as not to generate others we must try to pay attention to these things but the most important thing is the message, which can reach the table in a moment of tranquility, I have already said the fact that the world does not belong to us, and this is an important thing, it is something that serves not as a judgment on our part, but as communion, in the sense that we must not look for something that should make us feel good, that should belong to us, something that should come automatically , we have to understand it regardless of many things, so for us, what the environmental impact can be, sustainability is important, we don’t use fertilizers, we don’t use sulphites in our wines, we try to keep things as natural as possible also because the authenticity of a product to eat and everything else certainly also brings in the line of sustainability because it does not need external processing, of those which can be chemical structures therefore which are done through a project of a company or a structure but rather with what nature gives us with the environment, the various humidity and everything else we move forward. What can a customer expect when he enters your restaurant? Well um let’s say that we have always had very high expectations, because there is this type of situation that leads one to ask the innkeeper the pig what it means, the name itself can hint at a meaning, people often ask around, why do we we are not very social, for better or for worse I mean it is our choice, um the fact is that this is not a restaurant it is not a trattoria it is not a tavern but it is a degusteria, something that is not different because we we are different, probably because we are spontaneous, we are direct, we are true, um what people expect from the innkeeper the pig is a bit like what I said at this stage, the fact of having expectations, but of what you expect from a restaurant, let’s say from a modality which could be the tavern or what is the classic menu with the first course, the second course, the appetizer, I mean we don’t do it, because I always say that our structure is like the house of a friend, at the house of a friend it’s not that they prepare the ham with the morsel, then they make you the first course, they liquidate you and you leave, it’s not that they make you a bit of roasted meat, the hospitality, the lady starts preparing a few days before, the husband or whoever stops by the butcher on his behalf says, listen, save me five nice slices of meat that I have people at home together, husband and wife decide, what do you say, let’s take that caciocavallo cheese that we have downstairs, we take that bottle of wine that we got there, that is hospitality in the sense that this is our job, we have chosen to do this job and therefore it is right that we as in your place which rightly, today life belongs to the woman that the man is full of commitments and everything else but also for women who don’t work with the family, the woman still manages the house, so with the children bring a balance for the man for the children for the family, the children busy with school, after school, going to the gym, going to the swimming pool and making music and dancing, it takes up a lot of your time so the lady arrives at the supermarket and tries to do her best in looking for the things that rightly, the supermarket is a project of a multinational, it can give you we do research, I mean our job we also try not to have to deal with representatives but not as a matter of choice, to shoot poses, because we probably don’t even need to, given what we do , what we propose also because this is mum and dad’s house we have done, we have 40 places, if we do 35 even better we could do 45 but not more because, otherwise we won’t succeed, but already in terms of production, research, work of everything what is done because we can say a lot, but there is a lot here work to be done around these things so getting more people means like breaking the toy, something we can’t do anymore, so I mean people’s expectations are certainly high but they are the classic ones, the ones they expect, that is, not come here and find the classic first and second course or what to say, the paper placed on the table with the menu, we are a spontaneous cuisine, we are an express cuisine also regarding what you asked me before we are a territorial cuisine, we belong to this territory so I can tell you about my territory which goes from this curtain to the other curtain, as I said before, and we are a seasonal cuisine only seasonal products we believe a lot in seasonality because it also makes us understand the course and path of the period of the year , through which you can feel Christmas, Easter, Spring, Winter, Autumn or anything else, precisely through what food is, eating, so this thing is important for us to communicate, to people it is only one has to go to the restaurant to feed oneself or because one has to go to eat that particular thing, today one also goes to the restaurant to relax and if we have chosen to do this, we want to call it a restaurant, no in this case which is a degusteria it is precisely because we do research instead of those who come to sit here, they have their life, we have ours, we have chosen to do this job, you have chosen to do yours, our job from my point of view requires us to do research why wait for the representative who sells to me as he sells to my other colleague who is in the same country or in the country next door and everything else, yes it changes the fact of how to cook it, how to prepare it, how to interpret it but fundamentally we are talking about that matter, for the matter you need to do research, also based on what is good in your point of view. I’m lucky because what I research, my taste and everything in my head appeals to many people a bit, I mean, so for me this is definitely a fortune but bringing authenticity to the table and doing research towards this job is definitely not doing business, like buying and selling, or working with a PDA, having kids at the table who simply come to see what you need , to put the corrections with more or less, what can be with more cheese or less cheese, more sauce or without sauce, with oil or without oil and everything else, to have an average per capita, all this goes a a little to diminish what hospitality can be, a fact that I want to say is that ours is a project that does not go towards commercialism, not because we are the Innkeeper and the Pig, but because it is a bit like our living Modus we don’t do anything extraordinary, we are simple people, we are a bit like a house that hosts people and that everyone who comes has to sit down and be calm, serene, we are here for them, we do it, I mean, in the best way , we can certainly make mistakes because everyone makes mistakes , but there is certainly not a commercial project behind this structure but there is a hospitality communication project that comes first. You spoke to us earlier about seasonality, can I ask you why? is he so firm on this concept and why does he care so much about it? Well as I have already announced to you, I said before even if briefly the seasonality is a bit what dictates the time of the year, it is what dictates the various periods of the year, what makes you feel the period here today is It’s true that we go to the greengrocer and find everything, we go to the supermarket, even better we can eat cherries at Christmas, however, if we eat cherries at Christmas we don’t eat dates or mandarins or oranges, the apple is still put in straw, and we we eat cherries, like apricots and everything else, certainly our brain, now what we feel is the cold, and it can’t even make associations, maybe I mean for us, for me who am a little older , I mean I’m definitely a few years older, even more for my father and for my grandfather we know the various periods because my father is someone who today is passionate about agriculture, he enjoys the land, so he knows the periods but the majority, already you who are younger and those who come later, and so on, will feel this situation less and less, we in this structure , in this company, for example we have our own method , in the sense that if someone comes at this moment and asks me did I want that thing there, for example it happens on vegetables ok, because when you mean it you bring us two small vegetables but you don’t even mean it the salad, always but truly always, grilled courgettes and aubergines we certainly do the grilled courgettes and aubergines but when there are courgettes when there are aubergines because in this moment of grilling I can make an escarole I put it on the plate, the cauliflower, I’ll steam it for you and sauté it in the pan, eh there’s black cabbage, no, for the soup, basically the cabbage is cleaned, steamed and so on or it’s done in a pan crackled I mean, it’s very good, the broccoli is finished in this period, somewhere there are the "apriliatici", the last broccoli, it is the slimiest broccoli, but also everything that could be aubergines or pigs for example, we process the pork from 8 December until the end of February, beginning of March, the pig is an animal that eats everything and everything and then we can always have it, so there is no problem, our pigs, large animals and so on, are only eaten in that period December 8th traditionally end of February beginning of March or rather until pigs run out, outside of this period, I mean, from this date, pork, grilled meat, cutlet, sausage, big sausage we don’t make them anymore, so here we go it’s the person who comes says but I wanted some pork, we answer so you have to come when there’s pork because this is not the time for pork, someone else comes and says for example, a Easter says we want the kid with peas and potatoes, I said ma’am, I ask my mother why mother still cooks peas like she used to, as was done before, then it’s a vegetable that can be frozen, look, I ask my mother if it still has the peas, I prepare it with the kid, because otherwise we do it with the potatoes and artichokes, because the artichokes fit, so nothing extraordinary I mean, we focus on what the period is, because it is important that it is like this , it is matter that also goes into sustainability, therefore it is not forced that it does not come from another part of the world that does not come from another part of Italy because, for example, Sicily is far from us, therefore it does not come this structure is forced, but rather it works in a natural way, there are no tanning structures that speed up the greenhouses and everything else but we eat based on the territory, based on the time of the year, and based on the type of situation, this is certainly a sense of goodness, it is a sense of authenticity, but first and foremost it is a sense of goodness because I mean, it is important to use the products in the right period, certainly also from an economic point of view, the courgette and aubergine bought in June, in July, August or September, for example last year the aubergines almost until December because there was a particular heat, I mean but buy in this period when our land also offers us these things, they are paid at the right price , because there are plenty of them, while in other periods that can cost more, therefore it also weighs on what could be the average economy of a balanced family, but leaving this aside, for us the authenticity of a product, so the time of year is something we respect at the beginning of everything, it’s what we do, the time of year is important for us, the seasonality of the products is what is important. If you like, you can tell us about a dish which has a lot of importance for her, which reminds her of a particular period, no, I’ll tell you about a dish that doesn’t have a specific period and which is practically the dish that has always fed people in a natural way, I mean everyone starting from this, here is the omelette, we call it the "poor man’s" omelette because it comes from nothing, this free hen, at the time the farmyard hen, I mentioned it before, the fact of this free animal, which no longer it is more so, which used to scratch around, now it is locked in a cage, it eats what we give it, eh the hen therefore, a free animal that is no longer free, it is called a courtyard animal, you can no longer find chickens in the courtyards a bit a controversial situation which however has always fed, I mean the families, in what was the period of difficulty, this hen which was also the communication of the courtyard because everyone knew where the hen laid her egg under the steps, near the wall, under the plants and this egg was taken, perhaps nowadays there would be a race to get these eggs first, but yesterday even if there was nothing I mean, there was a sort of respect, take them you who have the little child, you who have your father who is elderly, I’ll take it because I have to make baked pasta for my daughter’s father-in-law, but it was a bit of the union of the curtain so from this thing the "poor man’s omelette" was born "which is made in a short time, in these natural non-stick copper pans where there is no Teflon, it is made on the fire, two eggs, the stale bread, and whatever is the second element that is there at that moment, in that period of the year, therefore it also tells a little about the seasonality of that moment but it is a dish that can be made 365 days a year which also becomes rich, especially in the period of our pigs from December 8th until the end of February, beginning of March where we use the sausage, the cotechino, the tauciano, the pezzentella, everyone calls it differently, practically this sausage is very good let’s say made with sopressata paste, which precedes the sopressata, we use it to dry and this one here or we do it roasted or we do it in the omelette or with potatoes, we do it in all sorts of ways, even with broccoli, but in the pork period we put it in the omelette and it becomes the rich omelette, in this period the asparagus, the tails of the artichoke, the heart of the artichoke, for example an artichoke with hair that needs to be recovered, ok you open it , clean it, remove the hair, you can use it in all ways, including in an omelette, or cauliflowers , the cabbage, the courgette, the agretti, the garlic, the garlic tails, the wild garlic, the fresh onion, the potato, whatever is in the house, as it was done before, here, here, the circular kitchen also intervenes for a moment for the environment what you put in the omelette, we make it this way, with these two eggs we cook it quickly, hello, hey, it gets sloppy in the center, it’s important to cook it quickly so that it stays blenny in the center, raw, and this is our dish that we have 365 days a year, we have many dishes, this one in particular is always seasonal, it welcomes the season but which is always there within this structure This is a brazier that I built after my trip to Madagascar, the normal furnace, unlike the one present in our markets which is in the shape of a parallelepiped, this one is a trapezoid. They placed the pot on the coals, with cereals or rice, when the evening arrived, the coals were consumed and the pan rested on all four sides, at first I didn’t understand, I went back and replicated it, and so I can do various cooking methods here, I mean in addition to the classic cooking methods, like the meat hung, we use it as a smoker we do a few things, there is a fire underneath, so this heats up the meat is cooked we get the Maillard reaction and then we put it on top and let it reach the temperature we want it is useful, if we want to smoke it, we smoke it, the wood I use is purely fruit wood, mainly chestnut wood from the forest of my partner who lives nearby, in Montoro a Banzano, who uses chestnuts and his wood, then all the fruit behind my land, from Marco and my cousin Gianluca, what is pruned, therefore grape scraps which are the best, ok the olive tree and we use all the rest of the fruit in general, and behind here with these two fireplaces that are mirrored I have this small woodshed for temporary storage where I put the wood I need, depending on the cooking I want to do, I mean but we’re going forward technology certainly helps us yes but we must know how to use it without ever forgetting what happens, what natural things are, so I explained to you the pan that "o’ furztiell", what it is is an assistance pan, a pan that if you put it on the fire since it has an iron handle, you leave it, this handle hangs behind and unlike what can be the classic pan which has a copper handle and an iron handle, so these pans left must be assisted, because if you leave them the handle hangs back and everything falls out, ok so they were used to cook foods that had to be followed, assisted, in other cases this other pan was used, for the corn pizza you see it was also made with the support central so that when it is placed, it was used, it must still be controlled, because the corn pizza is made with holes, with the spoon, to show that first there is the steam which dries, then there is the ‘oil that rises, that goes from blonde to burnt in a moment the corn flour, so it had to be assisted, like many other things therefore, it’s not that the old ones were better than us, rightly they had everything but they had nothing, they made do because what they had they worked in a certain way okay so I’ll explain, I’ll explain I don’t have to explain anything to you, let’s make an omelette, let’s make an omelette with what we have, the so-called "poor man’s" omelette, we’ll put in stale bread always, ok, we put it in the pan so we already put the oil and the second element, what we have, this is the asparagus period this is mountain asparagus you see, I showed you them before there all small, this one of ours friend from Castel San Giorgio, he is a gentleman who brings asparagus during the asparagus period, during the mushroom period he brings mushrooms, during the tack period he brings me tacks so with this person, well, I have a particular relationship, it may seem strange but not I say this for a particular question, but if you go to collect waste, if you go to collect anything else in a land where for example there has been a fire, where something harmful has been thrown away, I mean water polluted, you have to be careful and know where to pick the asparagus as well as the mushrooms and the rest, it’s ok so you fry it a bit like this you take the egg, two eggs the parmesan as you usually make the omelette, a pinch of pepper , a little salt, you see, they are very difficult to beat because they are strong, it’s the original procedure, what you put in the omelette is put in the egg, this bread we made absorbs, ok so it absorbs the egg , some even say, what’s inside the meat? ok, my grandmother said that she put everything in the omelette as long as the families could eat, so hot pan, here you go, put it in and start to swell on the sides, it’s a very quick recipe, sometimes you have to add oil, like this we ask for help because two large eggs, so they still can’t be turned, then the first fry in the pan is always like this so it’s already ready, you put it on the stick, a pinch of cheese underneath, you put it on the stick and it’s ready because the its characteristic, now I’ll show it to you cooked on the outside and slightly raw or slimy in the centre, here it is the "poor man’s" omelette, made as it used to be once cooked and turned quickly, it’s a simple thing, at the moment there are asparagus but everything goes ok, in the "poor man’s" omelette all you have, soon is the period of the onion, the wild garlic, towards the end of May there is the wild garlic, the wild garlic, the agretti a few days ago, what you have are almost ready, the onion, the first fresh potatoes, the courgettes, the aubergines, what you have what you put in, this was home food, what they had in this curtain, where it served as a factor of conviviality, it was used for chatting because with the egg it was the thing that allowed us to talk, take them if you have a small child, if you have your father who is elderly, I will take it and my sister’s father-in-law house, of my daughter to make baked pasta, here’s a way of communion, but also simply, check on the children for a moment, I have to hang out the clothes, check on them, I have to light the fire, as they say, the neighbor is half a relative, a something that we no longer feel, but at least I feel it, because it still exists, I say that my world, my territoriality, lies within the boundaries of my property, both on one side and on the other, beyond, it is not my neighbor, he is my neighbor’s neighbor. although we know each other, we are from the village, the situation has changed, and in any case the omelette of the "poor man" is communication, it was aggregation in a curtain, the fact of sharing something, today instead we pay attention to what we say, so as not to be heard, and for what reason? freedom is a beautiful thing, an important thing, sharing is something that always exists, we are in the village, it is something that belongs to everyone. A thousand thanks
