Evoluzione @ Hotel Xenia Kensington
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160 Cromwell Road, SW5 0TL
020 7442 4242/http://www.hotelxenia.co.uk/evoluzione.html
The Cromwell Road isn’t the most glamorous of locations but rather unexpectedly it is home to the rather chic Hotel Xenia and its restaurant Evoluzione. The Xenia management have come up with the splendid idea of having a monthly guest chef event showcasing the Italian regions and I was invited along to the first one to see what they were up to.
The season opened with Michelin starred chef Pietro d’Agostino who runs La Capinera restaurant in Taormina, Sicily. Pietro was ably assisted by resident chef Andrea Angeletti and his team.
Pietro gave us an introduction to the Sicilian produce that would feature in the meal. He told us about the almonds, oranges, capers and olive oil whilst we sipped a delicious DaEtna Bianco Chardonnay and nibbled on breads and olive oil.
The first dish out were rather amazing ‘noodles’ fashioned out of scallops with a slightly unnecessary raspberry sauce.
King prawns came beautifully presented with an onion salad and a delicious almond and orange sauce.
Black cod was translucent, just cooked and really tasty-spiked with capers marinated in Marsala. Our next wine pairing was a DaEtna Rosato. It’s a natural wine and unusually for a rosé was both herby and mineral-unusual and delicious.
Silky seafood ravioli (I know it looks like a tortellini but apparently in parts of Italy all stuffed pasta are known as ravioli) came with capers, Sicilian wild fennel, pistachio from Bronté and was served bathed in a delicious fish broth. This was an elegant and refined dish.
Roast Turbot was a substantial tranche beautifully framed by the asparagus, aubergine, squid and artichoke and robust enough to match with the cherry flavours of our glass of Altho Rosso 2012 DOC.
A succession of desserts created by pastry chef Manuele Francesco started flying out of the kitchen-my favourite was the fresh ricotta stuffed cannoli which were the best I have tasted and the wonderful accompanying Mandorvin bianco almond sweet wine got me pissed enough to jump on the piano in the lounge and start performing…
Having this regional guest chef event is a great idea and at £65 per head is reasonably priced. I have listed dates below. I think this should be supported!
21st April Mario Demuro- Basilicata
26th May Teresa Buongiorno- Puglia
24th June Luca Collami- Liguria
14th July Andrea Incerti Emilia- Romagna
8th September Donato Episcopo- Veneto
21st October Paolo Barrale- Campania
25th November Stefano Masanti- Lombardia
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