“I am part of a family of seven children, each of us does a different thing, we are scattered around the world. My life as a boy started with Judo, I was in the national team, I competed at international levels, then at a certain point the direction of my existence changed, I had to stop with sport because between injuries and changes, keeping up with the new generations of athletes, physically very different, became complex. And so I reinvented myself “. To speak is Emanuele Riemma, a very young pizza chef who had already been talked about by Pizzanova in Pozzuoli (heir to another enfant prodige, now more than accomplished, Diego Vitagliano) and who today is the tip of Maiori, an entrepreneurial project that has brought Neapolitan pizza to the heart of Cagliari. In that Palazzo Doglio which was a noble residence and today houses a five-star luxury hotel belonging to the Forte group and three very different concept foods in its square. Oriental, fine food and Neapolitan pizza.
In this concentration of three of the main threads of the most popular food and wine (in fact, only the contemporary restaurant is missing), Emanuele has brought the last step of his professional career. A very long route, in terms of kilometers. “When I gave up professional competitive sport, I decided that I had to make a change in my life. And then I went to Australia, where one of my brothers always has a business in the food and wine sector. I worked with him for a long time, I cut my teeth. Then I decided to go home, to try to test myself on my own. “He has the face a bit of an elf as he tells a decidedly adventurous and eventful life, full of events and changes, when compared to 20 years and little more than is carried on the shoulders.
An age that can be found in the smile, in the slightly elf-like air, but which clashes – in the contemporary conception – with the air of an entrepreneur with his head on his shoulders that reveals as soon as there is time to talk to us for a moment more. “Initially I came here for a short-term project, I had to set up a consultancy and then leave, but I was so enthusiastic about the idea of telling Neapolitan pizza in a region where it is not yet widespread, that I proposed to the owners of Maiori to stay. To be part of this new reality permanently. They accepted and so here I am “. Here is an island in the middle of the sea, its capital and a place that would not disfigure in terms of aesthetics and concept even in the largest metropolises. Emanuele follows the food plant with advice from Raffaele Bonetta, already well known in Naples and abroad for its very fine technique in terms of dough and leavened products.
“I chose the team and I trained my boys from day one”, guys who are the same age as him, maybe even a little more. “I also managed to find a particularly gifted baker”, he stresses with the smile of those who know that inside the ring road and its surroundings, the work as a wingman is increasingly mistreated, in favor of the counter lights and (for some, they hope) of the limelight. “Initially I didn’t even have a day off, not even five minutes. Today after a few months (between lockdowns, closures and curfews, the restaurant opened in February 2021, ed) I understood, helped by the owners, that relinquishing does not mean not knowing how to do it. or not wanting to work, but to ensure continuity to work. These last two years have taught us that anyone can suddenly fall ill, leave the oven uncovered and the team without an irreplaceable figure would not be fair to the team “.
A team that moves in a room of over 100 seats, between the external courtyard and internal spaces, with a decidedly “chic” contemporary style, bordering on the shabby, as professional interior designers would call it, but with a firm eye on what are today, and always have been, the aesthetic trends of the Amalfi Coast to which this place is ideally dedicated. The dishes are reminiscent of the original Vietri ceramics, the same ones that are hung on the wall inside the pizzeria in a moment of furniture that refines without being cloying or folkloristic. In front of the oven there is a tasting table that winks at the chef tables of the most famous restaurants, “but which, with the various restrictions, we have not yet been able to use as we would like”. And if the aesthetic recalls the sea, Amalfi, the lemons and the views that the whole world knows, the pizza is decidedly Neapolitan. A contemporary Neapolitan, but with a gentler air and a less pronounced cornice than that of some of her colleagues, even compared to its own past, “because here it would have been decidedly excessive, if presented to an audience not accustomed to that type of leavened products”. Concrete and objective, even if excited and enthusiastic.
The menu is concrete, without frills. The starters are the classic fritturine (pasta omelette, crocché and arancino, the first definitely valid), the pizzas vary from the traditional ones (the capriccio is a very funny modern capricciosa and the bufalina an author’s proof not taken for granted so far from home and from finding suitable raw materials) to the most creative ones. Among the latter in winter the Nduja and fennel showed an interesting ability to play with combinations and serving the disc of pasta, a bit like the Tuna and onion Maiori, which tries to give dignity to a recipe that is little considered and much criticized, with buffalo mozzarella Dop, Tropea onion in marinade, marinated red tuna carpaccio, cherry tomatoes rubies, basil and extra virgin olive oil.
The service, delightfully prepared, attentive, friendly and elegant, closes the circle of an adventure that seems to mean that Emanuele has really come to the right place. Last note, the flagship of the place, an American bar that is very rare to find in pop clubs, especially in pizzerias, beyond the region. The ideal to which head bartender Antonio Varrotto aspires (and succeeds) is that of the hotel bar, where you can let yourself be pampered by those on the other side of the counter. Far from creating instagrammable but undrinkable cocktails, here those who handle the glasses and bottles are more than skilled and in addition to a respectable bottle bottle, they know the recipes of Emanuele, with whom he works side by side, which he manages to combine with cocktails more fun, original and respectful of the dictates of mixology at the same time.
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