Page 37 - Protagonist 108

In a former post station in Italy or in Hong Kong:
the truffle can find its loftiest

expression in Europe and in China. Welcome to the
Antica Corona Reale and to L’Altro

BY ANDREA GRIGNAFFINI AND ALICE LIANG

A n earthy, intense and robust aroma, uniting as truffles, is today the location of one of the most emblematic
Italy and Hong Kong and creating a link of eateries in Italy; a place which, in the succession of the generations
world taste. It is the truffle. How can you that have populated it, has done nothing other than broaden its
resist it? And why should you? For rarity and their culinary limits like orbits surrounding the planet of the tradition
seasonal nature, these “diamonds” of the kitchen of old Piedmont. We are at the Antica Corona Reale in Cervere,
are more and more the real challenge of a chef’s gastronomic which was already a safe bet for hungry travellers in 1815,
art. Perhaps a family art, passed down for two centuries, which, although truth be told, it was more properly so from 1855 which,
like many stories in the great Italian restaurant tradition, has as attested by municipal document, was the year its destiny was
taken shape in a very specific place: a humble post station. Yes, bound to the history of the Vivalda family. Antica Corona Reale
a former coaching inn, former tavern and former farmhouse in lies completely outside the concept of simple restaurant: indeed,
rural Piedmont, in the north of Italy, a land of wines as valuable it would be an understatement to limit it to being just a place

Above, the private 12-seat dining room set up in the cellar. Left page, eggs en cocotte with white truffle from Alba, the refinement
of the ingredients blends wonderfully with the simplicity of traditional fare. This is the formula
(two Michelin stars) of Gian Piero Vivalda and his Antica Corona Reale in Cervere, in the Langhe district (anticacoronareale.com).

37N. 108 / PROTAGONIST