We’ve all longed to test-drive a Ferrari. Head to Modena to achieve that ambition. A day organised by ModenaTur starts with that Ferrari-fest and goes on to include workshop tours of other marques. Learn Lamborghini’s secrets and go for mega-immersion in the creed of Massimo Bottura.
Yes, the star of Robb Report Hong Kong’s 2023 Culinary Masters, that amazing event hosted at MGM Cotai two summers ago, is Modenese through and through. Overnight at Casa Maria Luigia, the “country inn” that Bottura and his wife Lara Gilmore opened five years ago. The term “country inn” shows Bottura humour. The 12-bedroom hotel, in a building dating back to the 18th century, is more like a blown-up, grown-up dollhouse, an adult-only stay-place. It’s symmetrical, with a lookout room plonked atop. Favourites include the 100-square-metre penthouse, or the separate 200-square-metre cottage, which has three bedrooms.
Image courtesy of Marco Poderi/Casa Maria Luigia
The Bottura belief is generosity. All room at Casa Maria Luigia include free minibars, snack, and breakfast (oh, we all love generosity, like the kind of memorable from any stay at a Peninsula hotel; check in the 6 am if you like, and the following day, check out at 6 pm if you must, and the cost is still only one night). Casa Maria Luigia, with Bottura in charge, naturally also offers memorable pay-for food. At Francescana, it’s a nine-course extravaganza, with such dishes as Five Ages of Parmigiano Reggiano in different textures and temperatures, and Oops! I Dropped the Lemon Tart.
This sense of humour continues throughout the growing empire that Bottura is creating. At Seoul’s Gucci Osteria da Massimo Bottura, on the top floor of the Gucci Gaok flagship store in Itaewon, for instance, there’s Korean cuisine from Hyungkyu Jun. His signature Jeju pork is inspired by that area’s Hallasan mountain trail: Jeju black pork sirloin is grilled over binchō-tan charcoal, and paired with canola flowers and chamnamul pesto, so essentially high in calcium, potassium, and other nutrients. Jun’s Italian counterpart, chef Davide Cardellini, meanwhile, makes his impact differently. He serves his signature Emilia burger in a baby-pink cardboard box.
Image courtesy of Capella Singapore
Singapore would, by the way, like to be considered the food capital of Southeast Asia, and hotels are doing their bit. On Sentosa, Capella Singapore has turned a little-used sitting room above the main lobby into The Pineapple Room, named in honour of the traditional symbolic fruit of hospitality. It’s serving cocktails and such bites as chilli crab pie tee, pan-fried Hokkaido scallops in ginger flower-pineapple sauce, and sakura chicken satay.
Image courtesy of Raffles Singapore
On the main island, Raffles Singapore is always up to something. At the moment, for instance, its Yì by Jereme Leung is, through 24 November, celebrating hairy crab. Think baked hairy crab with lemongrass, osmanthus, and wolfberry ginger tea, or Yangcheng crispy rice noodles with stuffed tofu skin and hairy crab roe.
