Accordi's a dining circuit
If you happen to be there at just the right time, you might catch Prague’s first ever Michelin star chef waiting in line at McDonald’s.Mind you, this is a man who spends most of his waking hours shaving truffles so fine that the celebrated musty flavor blends into the pasta, and teasing foie gras with just enough heat so the delicate skin begins to caramelize. Fiercely devoted to quality, he roams local farms, seeking out the best fresh herbs and vegetables. Give him a pan and a stove top and he coaxes stringy guancale into a state so ethereal the meat seems to evaporate on your tongue. Yet he readily admits to scanning McDonald’s list of artless burgers on more than one occasion. If you challenge him, he defends the apparent sacrilege blankly. “There’s nothing wrong with it,” says Andrea Accordi, the 31-year-old Italian who brought instant fame to Allegro — and to the city. “We have fine food and junk food; my son likes a lot of junk food.” So when Accordi’s young offspring clamors for a trip to the iconic Golden Arches, he not only obliges, but also orders something for himself. And the highly skilled chef doesn’t care if anyone catches him in the act.“When I’m off,” he explains, “I want to switch off, be with my family.”For people accustomed to Gordon Ramsay’s blasphemous outbursts, Emeril Legasse’s Flintstone-esque catchphrases or the consciously hip posing of Jamie Oliver, the only star on Prague’s culinary scene doesn’t seem like a real celebrity chef. Accordi’s disarmingly honest admission about McDonald’s is just a start. Turns out he’s about the only man from Italy who merely shrugs at the mention of AC Milan, Juventus, Fiorentina or the boys in national team blue. Some will tell you Italian media print football scandals, then Ferrari’s outcome in Formula 1, followed by the antics of Valentino Rossi.
If you happen to be there at just the right time, you might catch Prague’s first ever Michelin star chef waiting in line at McDonald’s.Mind you, this is a man who spends most of his waking hours shaving truffles so fine that the celebrated musty flavor blends into the pasta, and teasing foie gras with just enough heat so the delicate skin begins to caramelize. Fiercely devoted to quality, he roams local farms, seeking out the best fresh herbs and vegetables. Give him a pan and a stove top and he coaxes stringy guancale into a state so ethereal the meat seems to evaporate on your tongue. Yet he readily admits to scanning McDonald’s list of artless burgers on more than one occasion. If you challenge him, he defends the apparent sacrilege blankly. “There’s nothing wrong with it,” says Andrea Accordi, the 31-year-old Italian who brought instant fame to Allegro — and to the city. “We have fine food and junk food; my son likes a lot of junk food.” So when Accordi’s young offspring clamors for a trip to the iconic Golden Arches, he not only obliges, but also orders something for himself. And the highly skilled chef doesn’t care if anyone catches him in the act.“When I’m off,” he explains, “I want to switch off, be with my family.”For people accustomed to Gordon Ramsay’s blasphemous outbursts, Emeril Legasse’s Flintstone-esque catchphrases or the consciously hip posing of Jamie Oliver, the only star on Prague’s culinary scene doesn’t seem like a real celebrity chef. Accordi’s disarmingly honest admission about McDonald’s is just a start. Turns out he’s about the only man from Italy who merely shrugs at the mention of AC Milan, Juventus, Fiorentina or the boys in national team blue. Some will tell you Italian media print football scandals, then Ferrari’s outcome in Formula 1, followed by the antics of Valentino Rossi. Politics and other mundane news items wallow in the rear. But Accordi’s passions lay elsewhere.His emotions show not in verbal histrionics, but as an impish grin when he attempts to sneak foie gras onto his public relations manager’s plate, knowing the stuff makes her cringe, or a bright, genuine, infectious smile when he mentions family and his “24-hour lively boy.” If the discussion shifts to the topic of food — as it always will — Accordi’s expression evens out, becoming solid and earnest. These are the simple feelings of an everyman. So you begin to suspect that, by donning an apron, this normal, broad-faced, bespectacled Clark Kent from Verona somehow becomes superhuman.When news of Allegro’s Michelin star, the first awarded to any restaurant in Central or Eastern Europe, reached local media outlets, it was like a levee burst. Television crews barged into the dining room, reporters called for statements, radio stations demanded time for interviews — it was a Level Orange frenzy begging for someone with nerves of steel to calm the situation.“He was the same, even in that time,” says Martina Vávrová, public relations director for the Four Seasons Hotel and its stellar restaurant. Allegro’s team of 30 line cooks would scurry when she burst into the kitchen, dragging yet another videographer behind her, but Accordi obliged every reporter. “I admire him for being so patient,” she continues. “All those photo shoots, all that smiling — he’s really human.”But how does such a man, with such a demeanor, manage 30 tense line cooks in such an environment, if he’s merely human? “I can see in the kitchen they admire him,” Vávrová adds. “He says something, and they do it.”“He doesn’t yell.”So much for the superhero idea; And, really, Accordi’s just a quiet, self-assured, regular guy — except for many years of training and a virtuoso’s feel for bringing ingredients together into a singular expression of taste and texture. After sitting in on hundreds of interviews, Vávrová can recount much of the chef’s life story verbatim. In fact, he’s happy to leave the table, warning her to “be careful what you say.” Accordi took over the helm at Allegro at the end of August 2007, replacing longtime Prague favorite Vito Mollica. The chef’s parents pushed him into culinary school despite some backtalk from the boy. “I wanted to help my father with his job,” Accordi recalls — Vávrová uses the exact same words in third person. The elder Accordi dealt in the timber industry, shipping and receiving wood for commercial projects. “From the point of view of my father, it was a tough job,” Accordi says this time, taking his life back from the PR realm. No life for a talented boy who first helped out in professional kitchens at the age of 14.“But I must say …” the thought trails off into a chuckle.In most cases, only the insane or the superhuman choose cooking as a profession. The hours vary between horrendous and all-consuming, Cuts and burns are common occurrences. Kitchens swelter with heat. Equipment breaks down, egos flare, purveyors deliver wrong orders, guests demand this and that. Accordi bounced around between gigs in London, Bangkok and France, but the real process of becoming a chef began in Florence, at Onice in the Villa la Vedetta.“We had a beautiful product, but it was very expensive, as well,” he recalls. “We had very few covers for the first six months.” Trial by fireRestaurants shut down all the time, even in the heart of Tuscany. Sluggish traffic is generally enough to cause impatient investors to pull the plug, although many slash food costs and salaries, stretching death throes out for several months as service and quality plummet.“We decided to cut costs, but keep the same quality,” Accordi explains. “This is very tough.”Only 26 at the time, the chef plunged into the minutiae of purveyor contracts and employee schedules. He rummaged through busboy trays to find out if portions and side dishes were right. By checking prices at competing restaurants, he worked out what locals expected to pay for certain dishes — all the glamorous duties they rarely portray on television cooking shows, but which account for the success or failure of an establishment.“After a year, we increased our covers to 30, then 40,” he says.Accordi picked up a little souvenir from Michelin in the process, but apart from allowing a glimpse of pride in the achievement to slip through in the form of a quick, bright gleam, he discounts accolades earned then and now. “Part of being a famous chef with a Michelin star, without a Michelin star, whatever — sometimes the non-Michelin kitchens cook better — it takes dedication and passion,” he says. “And it’s very important for chefs to get this message across to the cooks.” So he shows up in the morning, checks the orders, berates a supplier if necessary (a moment hard to imagine), helps prepare for lunch and then begins a continuous program of staff training. Before dinner, it’s the same thing, along with inventory, new orders and whatever issues pop up during the evening.Home, family and the queue at McDonald’s act as refuges from this stormy life, but these things demand the same passion Accordi shows for his cooking. “It’s quite difficult when you work in the kitchen all day and get home late at night,” he admits, “not only for me, but most of the chefs.”Days may slip by before there’s time for a lazy conversation. The kids are often in bed by the time chefs make it home and out the door before chefs are fully awake in the morning. Burdens — ironically including the cooking — fall on spouses or partners.“They have to choose a very good wife,” Accordi says of men who cook for a living.He met and married Korrokod in Thailand. She worked in one of the top hotels and the bond formed around the usual feelings, of course. But her feel for the demands a professional kitchen makes on a person mattered, as well.Roman Paulus, chef at Alcron in the Radisson (and before that, at Hilton’s CzecHouse) believes mutual respect for long hours and intensity is critical for a successful relationship. Like chef Accordi, “I am lucky to have my wife working in the hospitality industry,” he explains. “She has an understanding for my job.” Thus, Accordi, like any other chef, considers that rare free day so important. It keeps him human, allows him to breathe for a moment.And if he chooses to spend that moment grabbing a pre-processed burger at McDonald’s, so be it. For a regular guy living a hectic life of cooking, bossing, talking and everything else that goes into a Michelin star restaurant, even the most mundane, normal act is one of passion.If things ever settle down, he says, “maybe I’ll watch football.”
If you happen to be there at just the right time, you might catch Prague’s first ever Michelin star chef waiting in line at McDonald’s.Mind you, this is a man who spends most of his waking hours shaving truffles so fine that the celebrated musty flavor blends into the pasta, and teasing foie gras with just enough heat so the delicate skin begins to caramelize. Fiercely devoted to quality, he roams local farms, seeking out the best fresh herbs and vegetables. Give him a pan and a stove top and he coaxes stringy guancale into a state so ethereal the meat seems to evaporate on your tongue. Yet he readily admits to scanning McDonald’s list of artless burgers on more than one occasion. If you challenge him, he defends the apparent sacrilege blankly. “There’s nothing wrong with it,” says Andrea Accordi, the 31-year-old Italian who brought instant fame to Allegro — and to the city. “We have fine food and junk food; my son likes a lot of junk food.” So when Accordi’s young offspring clamors for a trip to the iconic Golden Arches, he not only obliges, but also orders something for himself. And the highly skilled chef doesn’t care if anyone catches him in the act.“When I’m off,” he explains, “I want to switch off, be with my family.”For people accustomed to Gordon Ramsay’s blasphemous outbursts, Emeril Legasse’s Flintstone-esque catchphrases or the consciously hip posing of Jamie Oliver, the only star on Prague’s culinary scene doesn’t seem like a real celebrity chef. Accordi’s disarmingly honest admission about McDonald’s is just a start. Turns out he’s about the only man from Italy who merely shrugs at the mention of AC Milan, Juventus, Fiorentina or the boys in national team blue. Some will tell you Italian media print football scandals, then Ferrari’s outcome in Formula 1, followed by the antics of Valentino Rossi. Politics and other mundane news items wallow in the rear. But Accordi’s passions lay elsewhere.His emotions show not in verbal histrionics, but as an impish grin when he attempts to sneak foie gras onto his public relations manager’s plate, knowing the stuff makes her cringe, or a bright, genuine, infectious smile when he mentions family and his “24-hour lively boy.” If the discussion shifts to the topic of food — as it always will — Accordi’s expression evens out, becoming solid and earnest. These are the simple feelings of an everyman. So you begin to suspect that, by donning an apron, this normal, broad-faced, bespectacled Clark Kent from Verona somehow becomes superhuman.When news of Allegro’s Michelin star, the first awarded to any restaurant in Central or Eastern Europe, reached local media outlets, it was like a levee burst. Television crews barged into the dining room, reporters called for statements, radio stations demanded time for interviews — it was a Level Orange frenzy begging for someone with nerves of steel to calm the situation.“He was the same, even in that time,” says Martina Vávrová, public relations director for the Four Seasons Hotel and its stellar restaurant. Allegro’s team of 30 line cooks would scurry when she burst into the kitchen, dragging yet another videographer behind her, but Accordi obliged every reporter. “I admire him for being so patient,” she continues. “All those photo shoots, all that smiling — he’s really human.”But how does such a man, with such a demeanor, manage 30 tense line cooks in such an environment, if he’s merely human? “I can see in the kitchen they admire him,” Vávrová adds. “He says something, and they do it.”“He doesn’t yell.”So much for the superhero idea; And, really, Accordi’s just a quiet, self-assured, regular guy — except for many years of training and a virtuoso’s feel for bringing ingredients together into a singular expression of taste and texture. After sitting in on hundreds of interviews, Vávrová can recount much of the chef’s life story verbatim. In fact, he’s happy to leave the table, warning her to “be careful what you say.” Accordi took over the helm at Allegro at the end of August 2007, replacing longtime Prague favorite Vito Mollica. The chef’s parents pushed him into culinary school despite some backtalk from the boy. “I wanted to help my father with his job,” Accordi recalls — Vávrová uses the exact same words in third person. The elder Accordi dealt in the timber industry, shipping and receiving wood for commercial projects. “From the point of view of my father, it was a tough job,” Accordi says this time, taking his life back from the PR realm. No life for a talented boy who first helped out in professional kitchens at the age of 14.“But I must say …” the thought trails off into a chuckle.In most cases, only the insane or the superhuman choose cooking as a profession. The hours vary between horrendous and all-consuming, Cuts and burns are common occurrences. Kitchens swelter with heat. Equipment breaks down, egos flare, purveyors deliver wrong orders, guests demand this and that. Accordi bounced around between gigs in London, Bangkok and France, but the real process of becoming a chef began in Florence, at Onice in the Villa la Vedetta.“We had a beautiful product, but it was very expensive, as well,” he recalls. “We had very few covers for the first six months.” Trial by fireRestaurants shut down all the time, even in the heart of Tuscany. Sluggish traffic is generally enough to cause impatient investors to pull the plug, although many slash food costs and salaries, stretching death throes out for several months as service and quality plummet.“We decided to cut costs, but keep the same quality,” Accordi explains. “This is very tough.”Only 26 at the time, the chef plunged into the minutiae of purveyor contracts and employee schedules. He rummaged through busboy trays to find out if portions and side dishes were right. By checking prices at competing restaurants, he worked out what locals expected to pay for certain dishes — all the glamorous duties they rarely portray on television cooking shows, but which account for the success or failure of an establishment.“After a year, we increased our covers to 30, then 40,” he says.Accordi picked up a little souvenir from Michelin in the process, but apart from allowing a glimpse of pride in the achievement to slip through in the form of a quick, bright gleam, he discounts accolades earned then and now. “Part of being a famous chef with a Michelin star, without a Michelin star, whatever — sometimes the non-Michelin kitchens cook better — it takes dedication and passion,” he says. “And it’s very important for chefs to get this message across to the cooks.” So he shows up in the morning, checks the orders, berates a supplier if necessary (a moment hard to imagine), helps prepare for lunch and then begins a continuous program of staff training. Before dinner, it’s the same thing, along with inventory, new orders and whatever issues pop up during the evening.Home, family and the queue at McDonald’s act as refuges from this stormy life, but these things demand the same passion Accordi shows for his cooking. “It’s quite difficult when you work in the kitchen all day and get home late at night,” he admits, “not only for me, but most of the chefs.”Days may slip by before there’s time for a lazy conversation. The kids are often in bed by the time chefs make it home and out the door before chefs are fully awake in the morning. Burdens — ironically including the cooking — fall on spouses or partners.“They have to choose a very good wife,” Accordi says of men who cook for a living.He met and married Korrokod in Thailand. She worked in one of the top hotels and the bond formed around the usual feelings, of course. But her feel for the demands a professional kitchen makes on a person mattered, as well.Roman Paulus, chef at Alcron in the Radisson (and before that, at Hilton’s CzecHouse) believes mutual respect for long hours and intensity is critical for a successful relationship. Like chef Accordi, “I am lucky to have my wife working in the hospitality industry,” he explains. “She has an understanding for my job.” Thus, Accordi, like any other chef, considers that rare free day so important. It keeps him human, allows him to breathe for a moment.And if he chooses to spend that moment grabbing a pre-processed burger at McDonald’s, so be it. For a regular guy living a hectic life of cooking, bossing, talking and everything else that goes into a Michelin star restaurant, even the most mundane, normal act is one of passion.If things ever settle down, he says, “maybe I’ll watch football.”