What we are going through is a unique and particular period.

We are in quarantine: we have more free time and a great desire to make the most of it.

To stay with you in these days of “forced confinement”, we thought to let you in (virtually!) into our kitchen, to learn many recipes signed Excelsior Planet directly from our chef.

In fact, in the next few weeks we will start the “Excelsior Recipes” section: to get you in our world and taste its flavors.

Our Chef Fabrizio will explain and guide you in the preparation of many refined dishes tasty. These are recipes designed especially for you: with easy to find ingredients and simple procedures, so that you can try to recreate them at home, in your kitchen!

Before going practice and picking up pots and knives, we want to introduce you to the one who will guide us all on this culinary journey: our chef Fabrizio Reffo.

Interview with Chef Fabrizio Reffo

Hi Fabrizio, can you tell us a little bit about your story and how did you get to the Hotel Excelsior Planet?

I was born on 1967 in Varallo Sesia, a small town in Piedmont at the foot of Monte Rosa. After the compulsory schooling, I attended the hotelier school in Varallo the I.P.S.S.A.R “G. Pastore”.

In the summer 1981, at only 14 years old, I left home for my first work experience at the “La Clotze” restaurant in Planpincieu, Courmayeur (AO), where the Domaine family welcomed me like a son, and where I also went back the following summer.

On 1983 I finished my studies and I was selected by my cooking teacher, the Chef Giampiero Fiorani, to be part of his brigade for the summer season at the Grand Hotel Savoy in Cortina d’Ampezzo.

This was my springboard towards a long training path, which has me brought to work in the most renowned hotels and tourist resorts in Italy (among the most popular hotels: Villa Cortine Palace in Sirmione, Grand Hotel Principi di Piemonte in Sestriere, Grand Hotel Majestic in Pallanza, Gallia Palace Relais & Chateaux in Punta Ala).

On 1998 I started working as first Chef at the Hotel Principi di Piemonte in Sestriere, then arriving on 2003 at the Hotel Excelsior Planet in Cervinia, where a great was born relationship of collaboration, esteem and friendship with the Zanetti Family, which still persists.

 

What is your favorite dish?

 

Rice in all its interpretations, from East to West.

 

A tool and an ingredient that can never be missing in your kitchen?

 

The immersion mixer and the mandolin. For the ingredients, however, spices, in particular black pepper, ginger and curry.

 

And in your home fridge?

 

Tomatoes, parmesan, mayonnaise.

 

The dish you most often cook at home?

 

Risotto with porcini mushrooms, noodles with vegetables and prawns, Cantonese rice, mixed Piedmontese boiled meat.

 

The first dish you cooked and the last?

 

Potato dumplings with sausage for my family, when I was 13

Duck breast with mustard sauce.

 

Which recipe from our menu are you most fond of and why?

 

The rack of lamb in a crust of fine herbs, because it is one of my workhorses has been accompanying for many years, always enjoying high customer satisfaction.

 

Three words to define the cuisine of the Excelsior Planet?

 

Freshness, elegance, authenticity.

 

In this period which recipes do you recommend to try?

 

To answer to this question, you have to wait and follow the next videos…😊