To cook is to put your soul into it, but at Soul much more happens: the flavors are focused, the textures precise, the technique well-handled. This is how a team of young stars innovates Milan's gourmet scene.
The story
“I never expected to have a son enrolled in Confcommercio." Fabio Mecchina's dad says it softly, although in hindsight and especially with his palate, he is the first admirer of his son's dishes. Fabio's is a family in which everyone has always been an employee and handled numbers. Math teacher the mom, computer engineer the dad. Fabio has certainly not been the black sheep of the family. High school science went smoothly. Out of college, on the other hand, faculty of computer engineering based in Piazzale Leonardo da Vinci, he went. Smooth or not smooth, what matters is that Fabio made his choice. That is, opting for stoves and cold rooms rather than laptops and server rooms.
"I started working in the butcher shop. Meat cuts were my baptism. My manager also did some deli-type preparations. Sometimes I would go and eat at his place. From there I started to go my own way in the kitchen. Working as a pizza maker and a stock boy, I put money away to do the Boscolo Etoile Academy in Tuscania, three months full immersion and then three months of internship at Pierino Penati's. There it's as if I happened to be at the right time and the right age, because starting in a level restaurant at 24, with already some work done, is different than starting as a freshman. In fact, within a week I was running the appetizer lot by myself. I was doing very well, but then, through the school chef who knew my level of English, I got an opportunity to have an offer in London and I left."
The restaurant
Soul is not a small restaurant, although the appearance makes you think so. The white and light blue tones make it appear as a reserved and shy place. Where you don't get to raise your voice, only to converse peacefully. The kitchen raises its voice all right, the tastes are concentrated, the textures precise, the technique well handled. Fabio and his wife Gloria Marchesoni lead the way. He is from Busto Arsizio, she from Trento. "Galeotta" was London, a time when they both may not have had much of a chance to hang out but certainly to fall in love.
Gloria is a machine of discretion, a tightrope walker of precision. The ease with which she moves between tables, the right timing, and the friendliness she conveys are a sight to behold. Despite the high standard he never stops reiterating, he always makes you feel at ease. Fabio is a most efficient processor, one who leaves nothing to chance. "I spent five years in London between Rhodes 24, Fat Duck, and Petrus. Then Hélène Darroze's now three-starred, and two-star The Greenhouse and The Connaught. I worked from 8 a.m. until after midnight. But I saw it as an opportunity, which is something that is missing today as an approach. The more hours I work, the more things I learn. I grew up playing basketball and absorbed what Kobe Bryant used to talk about as the mamba mentality. The faster I work, the more I learn, and the more I improve myself."
Fabio is only thirty-five years old. Yet in comparison to the new young people, he looks like a veteran. The mentality is always in challenge mode, he tends to never sit down. We commented with him on Alessandro Borghese's opinion that today “the bargaining chip is time: my generation made work a mission, 5 hours or 15 didn't matter because that's where we wanted to get to, now people are looking for more freedom. I cannot blame them." Theoretically to us and Fabio it all came back apart from the concept of time and the concept of freedom-and you say little-as if today the time one spends working did not represent a chance for young men and women to discover themselves in action, and thus to discover themselves. What would be the point of rest, too, if there were no work first? Does freedom only mean being free from work? As if work were slavery regardless.
The extremes of a performance-dictated approach to work have generated the opposite extreme, that of work without stress, without goals, without effort, without correction, without taste. The work without. Which today, alas, is work without staff. This, too, gives rise to restaurants like Soul, places where the essence lies in the certainty of those who have put themselves on the line, even with a kitchen and dining brigade that can be counted on one hand.
The dishes
At Fat Duck Fabio underwent the timer method. They would ask him how long a specific preparation would take, set the timer, and run it. The goal was to stay under. Every day more. With this method he learned to do things well and fast. In the kitchen it is now a human timer, necessity has become virtue. Quality comes out on the pass without ups and downs.
Fabio does not hide a hand that has gathered a little bit of Italy, a little bit of France and a little bit of England. The sum of the experiences is a bit like saying: I do what I've learned. And these dishes! If you really want a definition, Fabio is a layerist cook. Of one ingredient he loves to research different levels of taste and textures. As in Shrimp Cocktail, a dish to combine the Lobster roll, his favorite British comfort food, and the classic shrimp dish in pink sauce. In Fabio's version, it is a brioche bun filled with freshly seared shrimp, rose sauce and julienne lettuce, paired with a real cocktail made with a crustacean consommé infused with lettuce and Testacoda gin. A technical yet mouthwatering dish.
Other layerist construction is Lamb, eggplant, kale. The whole saddle rests in a cell in straw for a week. The meat is brushed with cream of black garlic and bergamot to add a flavor profile and dilute the strong taste. It is then barbecued. Eggplants go into the oven to roast, are then made juicy with the extractor and reduced. Other peeled and squared eggplant is cooked at a low temperature along with the reduction, for serving needs. Finally comes barbecue cooking with the reduction used for moistening. The residue of the extraction becomes a puree along with spelt cooked in meat broth. The kale is in the form of a crispy leaf and as a braised part, obtained by cooking the vegetable with lamb reduction. Sweet paprika and roasted pine nuts are added to complete.
Lombardy and Trentino, Fabio and Gloria, come together in the dish that more than convinced us. Risotto, char, nettle and hazelnuts is a recipe that satisfies comfortable emotions and vibrant impulses. The contrasts not only greet each other, they complement each other perfectly. The result is disproportionately human. What more could you ask for from a perfectly cooked risotto, whipped with ricotta and Parmigiano, that enters the mouth like a sweet memory and then darts around to keep from getting caught?
For our menu, Gloria listened to our preferences and then directed us to a splendid mountain nebbiolo. The Valtellina Superiore La Spia ER64 is a reserve that bestows a double soul made of velvet and balsamic, woody spices, with a slight underlying acidity.
Soul recently completed its first five years. A mature place if one considers the approach; yet, still so full of boldness, typical of an age that does not know and does not want to grow old, that rebels, that does not give up.
Contact
Soul Restaurant
Via Goito, 9 - 20025 Legnano (MI)
Phone: 0331 1528524
