MARIANI’S

  February 13,  2005                                                         NEWSLETTER

EDITOR'S NOTE

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MY FAVORITE MANSIONS: VILLA FELTRINELLI by John Mariani

NEW YORK CORNER: Water's Edge by John Mariani

Quick Bytes

My Favorite Mansions  Villa F eltrinelli by John Mariani

          It's possible that God doled out more beautiful vistas to Italy than anywhere else. Fortunately for most of us they are freely available for viewing.  Still many of the most stunning have always been the private domains of very wealthy individuals who have sometimes improved, sometimes compromised the natural beauty of the territory.
 A case of the former is most certainly Villa Feltrinelli (365-79-8000; www.villafeltrinelli.com),an imposing but not outsized example of one man's vision for a place that would bring him peace and calm and a chance to look deeply into the mysterious workings of nature itself.   The actual story of that man has, however, more turmoil than peace to it, of which more later, but in our time and to the greater glory of Lake Garda, an American hotelier has taken it over, restored it, and offers it now for the delectation of anyone who can afford to stay there.
        Well before you arrive you are certainly well prepared for the magnificence of the Villa:  to get to it you must drive along some of the most stunning, cypress-lined scenery on the western shore of Lake Garda. Just past the town of Gargnano, you approach a gate beyond which lies a long, serpentine driveway  that leads down to the lake and to the Villa itself, spread over eight acres of magnificent landscaping.  Built in 1892 and designed by Milanese architect Alberico Barbiano di Belgioioso in the Pre-Raphaelite-inspired Liberty Style, the Villa was the summer home for timber magnate Faustino Feltrinelli, who used wood throughout the decor, often made in the trompe l'oeuil style to look like marble, which he loathed as too common.
       In his day Feltrinelli was as much a powerbroker as he was a tycoon, and he seems to have had a cozy, if pragmatic, relationship with Benito Mussolini, who lived here in isolation between 1943 and 1945.  Feltrinelli also had a very troubled relationship with his son, who, in a story that seems straight out of an Italian opera, was raised with little parental attention and later turned against his father and all he stood for as a symbol of rampant capitalism. The son used his part of the family fortunes to support communist causes and regimes, including Castro in Cuba, and, after his father's death, while busy managing his family's publishing company, he decided one day to blow up an Italian power plant and, in the process--Mio Dio!--got himself killed.
        His estranged mother continued to live at the Villa, but it deteriorated over the year, acquiring a national landmark status along the way.  Then, in 1997, American hotelier Bob Burns, of Robert  H. Burns Ventures and founder of Regent Hotels (which he supposedly sold to Four Seasons for $140 million), bought the place--after three years of delays dealing with the Italian bureaucracy--for $3 million.
   Over the next five years he's ploughed $30 million+ into its renovation, with the interior design work done by the San Francisco firm of  Babey Moulton Jue & Booth.  The results are really quite astounding, not only for the way modern amenities like air-conditioning have been seamlessly worked into this 19th century manse but in the impeccable taste exercised in every room and on every surface, preserving what was finest from the building's past while bringing everything into contemporaneity.
                                                               
      Entering  the foyer of the Villa places you in a room with tall, coffered ceilings, wooden benches, and a glorious chandelier, and to the right is a magnificent faux-marble staircase (above) actually made out of wood, flanked by  two 18th-century gilded mirrors once in the Borghese family, with colored light pouring in from two arched stained glass windows.
    There are 13 guestrooms in the Villa itself, seven with frescoed ceilings by the Lieti Brothers dating to the 1890s, each done in a different style and color scheme,  with artwork that ranges from Milan in the 1930s to  gouaches of Russian theater art.

 
The furnishings are of superb quality, including Pratesi and Frette linens, and bathrooms of daunting beauty, with cast-iron French porcelain tubs, and a generous of  array of  Acqua de Parma toiletries.  The capacious showers alone,  crafted in  California, are monuments of sleek, utilitarian art trouvé. The various rooms have names that are evoked by the decor--La Poeta (left), Del Capitano,  Casa di Fiori, La Rustica, and La Limonaia.
     As much as many people might well want to get away from it all by lapsing into the 19th century idleness of a place like Villa Feltrinelli and pretending that there is no world outside of Lake Garda, those a little more attuned to the 21st century will find flatscreen TVs with 50+ channels, excellent music systems, Internet access, and a wireless zone in the Library, which was formerly a billiard room.
      Downstairs are other grand and intimate public rooms, including a lovely little lounge named Bob's Bar (with Hawaiian surfing photos) where you may help yourself to a drink. A Bösendorfer piano is often used for music concerts, and a lounging salon with comfortable banquettes overlooks the blue lake in sight of Mount Baldo.  If you wish to dine outdoors, overlooking the pool--75-feet long and made of green slate--there is a romantic pergola where breakfast is served in good weather.
     Otherwise you feast quite splendidly in the Dining Room, where Chef Stefano Baiocci, formerly at El Bulli, is doing modern versions of regional Italian cooking that is both very refined and well bolstered by a superb winelist with some of the best small estates from the regions of Lombardy, Trentino-Alto Adige, and the Veneto.  Ask to visit the kitchen and wine cellar, a room itself of intimacy and grace, with more than 1,000 bottles stored.  There is also a private dining room with hand-painted fabric walls and  a baroque-style painting entitled the "Allegory of the Senses" designed to stir yours.
      There's much more: You may stroll the beautifully maintained grounds, planted with rare species, dotted with cypresses, pines, magnolias, and, curiously, palm trees, along with a "limonaia," a walled section of garden used to grow lemon trees. This is set next to a single three-story guest house.  There is a croquet lawn, lighted by gaslamps, and a dock where the Villa's boat La Contessa pulls up to take guests on excursions.   An additional residence, the Casa Rustica, has three more guestrooms done in a country style, and, last of all, there's the secluded Boat House, with a full kitchen, dining room, living room, bedroom, and outdoor patio.  It would be easy enough to fall in love with any of the rooms here and want to return to one in particular, but the offerings of style and atmosphere is designed as well to make every visit to the Villa unique.
      
        The surrounding area of Lake Garda gives the Villa its quiet charm, and it's easy enough to tour up and down the Lake in a day or two.  It is the largest of the north country lakes, sheltered by the Dolomites and quietly serene port towns like Desenzano del Garda, Gardone Riviera, Limone sul Garda, and the beautiful peninsular town--best avoided during the tourist season--of Sirmione (right), dominated by Scaliger's Castle behind whose walls is a fairytale village of narrow streets, lovely vistas, and more gelaterias than I've ever seen packed into such a small area.

 
  Salò (left) on the western shore, was once an important city of the Venetian Empire and shows its elegance still in the 15th-century Duomo and its winding streets down to the port, now fronted with boutiques and trattorias.  A few blocks from the port is the town's best, though wholly unpretentious, ristorante, Antica Trattoria delle Rosse (below), which you come upon suddenly while walking down the Via Gasparo del Salo (No. 33; 0365-43220) A long room leads out back to a pretty patio surrouned by grape vine trellises, and you sit down to a glass of prosecco while the very cordial owner recites the day's menu. Allow him to bring you some antipasti of Italian cured meats and cheeses. There is also a little tart of raw coregone (salmon trout) with chopped tomato and parsley. Then order the egg-rich tagliatelle with funghi porcini or the pappardelle with shards of tender duck meat, or perhaps the spaghetti alla pesce with seafood brought up from the port that morning.  There is a delicious rollatine of veal with funghi and rabbit in a funghi cream, made into paupiettes on a skewer.  The winelist is first-rate, especially if you want to learn as much as you want about the wines of the Veneto, from Ripasso-style Valpolicellas to massive, plum-like Amarones.  End off with a bite or two of chocolate torrone nougat made on the premises. A fulll meal here, before wine, but with service and tax, will run you about $40.
       Gargnano itself is a pleasant enough town whose most celebrated restaurant, La Tortuga, has one Michelin star, but it was closed the week we visited, so we settled for a soild and substantial meal at the rather forlorn-looking Ristorante Nuovo Ponte (56 Via Golf; 0365-711-57; www.albergoristorantenuovoponte.it), just down from the Villa Feltrinelli.  It's very plain, with walls half timbered and tile floors, and dull lighting, but the staff is very friendly and immediately brings you warm bread rolls with their own good green olive oil and pieces of toast with diced potatoes.  The winelist is very good, with bottlings from the Lake Garda region, most well under $35.  A meal here will run about $40.
       Our first course was white-and-green ravioli with a filling of fish, capers, and, I think, a touch of ginger, and some wide pappardelle with spicy, quite peppery vegetables including eggplant, carrots, and parsley--only o.k. Grilled lamb chops were delicious, but best of all was a platter of breaded and fried fillets of sardines perfectly cooked and taking well to the light red wines of the area. A squeeze of lemon from their own trees, and it's perfect.
        We got back to the Villa that evening around eleven and the moon had risen as high as it could go into the dark blue sky.  My wife and I strolled out to the dock and lay down on its edge, listening to the lapping of the water like a lullaby and watching the stars work their magic.  Within moments we'd both fallen asleep, and, though a warm, very soft bed awaited us back in our room, lying on that rough wooden dock seemed as restful a place to be in the whole world.

     T he appropriately named Water's Edge has for many years now been regarded as the East Side's counterpoint to the West Side's Tavern on the Green--extravagant places with spectacular views and kitchens whose foremost attention is on banquet dining. Indeed, there are no prettier places in NYC to hold a wedding or celebration than at either of these, with the Tavern straddling the leafiest part of Central Park and Water's Edge looking across the fast-flowing East River at the midtown Manhattan skyline.
      Yet both places have operated as restaurants too, and  with the acquisition this year of Chef Ari Nieminen, Water's Edge leaps formidably into the status of a dining room whose food is as good a reason to drive out to Queens as the panorama from its windows.  Actually, an even neater way to reach Water's Edge is by the restaurant's own ferry (left), which plies the East River between the 34th Street Pier and the restaurant's dock at 44th Drive on the other side, which is one of the most enchanting short trips you can take in New York. It leaves throughout the night once each hour, the last boat leaving the restaurant at 10:45 PM.
        Water's Edge is a big place that can accommodate up to 400 guests for parties, and the dining room has the same effusive decor and giddiness that makes it seem like you're part of one.  Window tables are, of course, among the favorites, and not a week goes by when one or another nervous gentleman pops the question with a diamond ring that he's arranged for the staff to hide somewhere or other.  But if you cannot score a window table, worry not: Every table in the dining room has a full view of that grand, glittering skyline, with the Empire State Building, Chrsyler Building, and Citycorp all arrayed like fortress towers against a sky that changes color from twilight through midnight.
         The staff, which includes a good number of Frenchmen, are very good at what they do, which is to make people feel very happy and attended to with a sure degree of savoir-faire.  The winelist is pretty strong across the board, with a judicious number of wines that don't bust the regular diner's budget, and there's a nice selection of Ports, Cognacs, and Single Malt Scotches at the end of the meal.
     Nieminen, whose work I applauded last year when he was at the Café des Artistes and before that at the FireBird, is from Finland, and he has a distinct talent for sumptuous dishes that take kindly to items like caviar, smoked salmon, foie gras, and truffles, which invariably find their way into his 3-course dinner menu, at $60, and his 4-course tasting menu, at $75.  Thus, you might start off with a thin-crusted appetizer pizza, but it will be dotted with truffles.  Hudson Valley foie gras comes with caramelized figs, suck propsciutto and toasted brioche, and crispy swqeetbreads are served with a rich onion soubise, goat's cheese gnocchi, and a deep, dark, well-rendered Madeira sauce.  You may also have fresh foie gras seared and served with a salad of baby spinach, quince and hockleberries whose tangy sweetness cuts the fat flavors.  For something simpler, have the grilled langoustines, which are meaty and delicious.
      The best entree I sampled was a very juicy roasted chicken with--you guessed it--Burgundy truffles, accompanied by whipped potatoes, green beans, button mushrooms, and the pan juces.   Given the enormous amount of cooking that must be done here, timing is both essential to its success and the thing that can compromise the best intentions.  Thus, while a dry-aged sirloin was of excellent quality, served with asparagus, potato cropuettes and a merlot reduction, it was cooked beyond medium-rare as requested.  So, too, was a pan-seared wild striped bass, with fingerling potatoes, roasted carrots and a red wine sauce, overcooked.  Quite impeccably cooked was a fine example of Dover sole, with fondant potato, asparagus, lemon and capers.
       Desserts are as lavish as what precedes them, from a superb apple tarte Tatin with caramel sauce and vanilla ice cream to a warm chocolate cake with prune-Armagnac ice cream, via pastry chef Michael Allen.
        It is difficult not to get excited by the prospect of an evening at Water's Edge because the consequences of such a ravishing city as a backdrop, the glistening waters of the rushing river, and the effusive greeting and service will work their magic.  Now, with a fine chef keeping the kitchen on an even kheel, this is a restaurant worth a ferry boat ride to reach.

NOW, WHY WOULD ANYONE THINK THAT?

LET ME TAKE YOU ON A SEA CRUISE

Dear Subscriber,

 I will be hosting a very special and, I think unique, cruise event this summer from June 4-16 on the  S. S. Crystal Serenity. I have chosen some of my favorite places in the whole world to visit and dine at, including Alain Ducasse’s illustrious three-star Louis XV restaurant in Monaco, and the enchanting Don Alfonso on the Amalfi Coast.  You will be treated to the finest these and other dedicated restaurateurs have to offer in their unique way.     I will be telling you everything worth knowing about the food and wines of the regions we visit—Dubrovnik, Barcelona, Monaco, Florence, St. Tropez, Sorrento, and Rome—including the best places to find haute cuisine to the most charming trattoria or the liveliest bistros and cafes.    
     My wife Galina, co-author with me of The Italian American Cookbook (which we’ll sign copies of), will also be giving an exclusive cooking lesson onboard I know you will enjoy.
    Between relaxing and enjoying yourselves onboard and coming with us to the loveliest sites and restaurants in the Mediterranean, you will have a unique and memorable trip and, I hope, become as familiar with these glorious places, cultures, and people as I am.     Galina and I look forward to seeing you onboard in June!    For details, go to http://www.festivalsafloat.com/html/mariani/letter.html
-- John Mariani

  

* Each Monday night at NYC’s Rock Center Café, chef Antonio Prontelli will offer a menu presenting 6 ways to enjoy fresh mozzarella, matched with a selection of Italian wines-by-the-glass. $8 to $12 each plate. Visit www.restaurantassociates.com or call 212-332-7620.

*Every Fri. & Sat. through March, NYC’s Café Centro will offer Chef Deletrain’s fondue menu at  $29 pp.  Call 212-818-1222 or visit www.restaurantassociates.com

MARIANI'S VIRTUAL GOURMET NEWSLETTER is published weekly.  Editor/Publisher: John Mariani. Contributing Writers: Robert Mariani,  Naomi  Kooker, Kirsten Skogerson,  Edward Brivio, Mort Hochstein, Lucy Gordan, Suzanne Wright. Contributing Photographers: Galina Stepanoff-Dargery,  Bobby Pirillo. Technical Advisor: Gerry McLoughlin.

 John Mariani is a columnist for Esquire, Wine Spectator, Diversion and the Harper Collection. He is author of The Encyclopedia of American Food & Drink (Lebhar-Friedman), The Dictionary of Italian Food and Drink (Broadway), and, with his wife Galina, the award-winning new Italian-American Cookbook (Harvard Common Press).

copyright John Mariani 2005