UNDER THE TASMANIAN SUN
At Meadowbank vineyard in the Derwent Valley, chefs FEDERICA ANDRISANI and OSKAR ROSSI of Hobart’s Fico prepare a leisurely lunch for friends.
Chefs Federica Andrisani and Oskar Rossi of Hobart’s Fico prepare a leisurely lunch.
One of the great strengths of Federica Andrisani and Oskar Rossi’s cooking is their ability to distil multiple influences into simple, direct flavours. At Fico, their Hobart restaurant, they combine Andrisani’s Italian heritage, her time working at Michelin-starred restaurants in Italy, and Rossi’s experience working in Italy and at restaurants like Vue de Monde with a shared passion for Tasmanian produce to original, delicious effect.
The recipes they’ve created for this issue reflect those influences but with a homespun approach, perfect for a Sunday lunch, in this case with their friends in the Meadowbank vineyard, just outside of Hobart in the Derwent Valley.
“We wanted it to be really simple food, something like you’d eat in a vineyard in Tuscany,” says Andrisani. “The inspiration is from my background – the pizza fritta is something you’d eat in Naples. It’s about using local products like the green tomatoes and zucchini flowers, so the recipes are seasonal, something you can cook at home and something like my mum would make.”
“It’s definitely a menu for the home chef in that it’s simpler than the way we cook at Fico,” says Rossi. “But it’s still Fico food that reflects our particular journey.”
So what exactly is “Fico food”? “It’s not easy to describe the style,” says Andrisani. “It’s very much our food with a strong identity – it comes from our different cultures, our families and our experience. But the landscape and the ingredients of Tasmania have a huge influence, too.”
One of the challenges – and some would say advantages – of cooking in Tasmania is that the supply chain for ingredients can be volatile. Mussels might be available at the beginning of the week but not by its end because of bad weather, and the supply of vegetables is strictly seasonal. It makes for nimble chefs.
“You have to have a winning format for a dish to be successful, but here, it also has to be interchangeable for what is available on the day,” says Rossi. So, if mussels aren’t available for the pasta, they might use sea urchin or octopus or clams. Same goes for the summer truffles accompanying the carne cruda.
“You can get a similar nutty flavour by slicing button or
Swiss brown mushrooms really thinly on a mandoline and then dressing them with lemon juice and olive oil,” says Rossi.
“It’s how my family cooked,” says Andrisani. “Using what was the best on the day.”
Fico, 151 Macquarie St, Hobart, Tas, (03) 6245 3391, ficofico.net