CORIGLIANO-ROSSANO – What will be inaugurated on Wednesday 26 June, from 8pm, on the Lungomare S. Angelo di Rossano (in Va Egeo 10), will not just be a new quality fish restaurant. Nor is it just a new concept of identity tasting in which, around ancient and modern mixology, stories and identities, flavors and roots of even different seas will be experimented with, from oysters to sciabbachedd.
The menu invites you to prefer local and seasonal fish – MiNiKə – Huitrerie Mixology & Šabbakehdd is and will also be an experiment in how we can and should do, from the bottom up, at the table, every day, without excessive pretensions and without extraordinary ambitions, a bit of healthy food education, above all with the absolute transparency on the exact origin of the catch indicated in the dishes on the conventional menu; but above all by explicitly explaining and inviting the guest, in the first pages of the menu, to prefer fresh and seasonal fish coming from the nearest ports, marinas and markets of Schiavonea, Cariati and Cirò Marina, displayed every day in the window . More explicit than that?
This is how Gennaro Scorza, the fourth generation of a century-long family and entrepreneurial experience, that of the Minichedds (from whose dialect epithet the naming of this new chapter and this vision that is renewed) derives, wants to strengthen that pact of loyalty and trust not only with those who decide to live the new MiNiKə experience, but above all with a land that from the sea to the countryside, from the coast to the hills, from the ancient fishermen’s boats to all its current innovation ambitions of its millenary heritage, she must necessarily recover her smile and love for herself and a lot, a lot of awareness of her own wealth and competitive ability. Indeed, everything at the table. Exciting.
And it is also with this spirit, of a solicited intelligent and joyful re-appropriation of one’s roots, that the guests of MiNiKə will be welcomed and introduced, together with the general menu and the mixology and wine lists, also with a first experiment (which will be periodically updated ) of the Charter of Extra Virgin Olive Oils of the territory, most likely an absolute first for Corigliano-Rossano and for Sibaritide and certainly among the few similar initiatives in Calabria, which is starting to fill an oicophobic void that is no longer sustainable for the lands and cities of oil of this peninsula of olive groves.
From the Santissima Achiropita, the name of the largest boat of the Minichedd to the sunrises and sunsets perceived at the rhythm of those who set sail and returned; from listening as a child to the indications, very precious and derived from ancient maritime tradition, on the exact direction, duration and evolution of the winds, up to the fascinating reading of the compass or how to steer the rudder, in those that were the last years before the arrival of echo sounders and radar.
The mind and soul of the then very young Gennaro (born in 1986) is also imbued with these frames, anecdotes and stories heard in those years of memory and cultural and entrepreneurial transition, almost like Manolin in the beautiful pages of the novel The Old Man and the sea by Ernest Hemingway: there is Uncle Giovanni who waves from the shore to announce an imminent and sudden storm; there is the casedda, which was not a simple warehouse where the now very rare tools of small-scale fishing were kept, such as lampare, boxes (which at the time were still made of wood), hooks and nets, but a real narrative place, a way of escape but also of rest, physical and imaginary for many daughters and grandchildren of the sea of an era without smartphones and which no longer exists today; it was an open but at the same time secret alcove in which you could find everything and more and in which, between handcrafted floats and that very strong taste of sea and salt, Gennaro too crossed the horizon in his mind and planned his future.
After graduating from scientific high school, he enrolled at university, at the faculty of law. But something doesn’t immediately add up to him, he doesn’t convince him, he doesn’t excite him and he doesn’t make him sail elsewhere, like when he instead spent hours in the fishermen’s hut.
Not even that 30 in philosophy of law can definitively support him on that path of training which he had undertaken with the sailors’ method, of setting sail to land and with the stubbornness and genetic and proverbial problem solving of the Minichedds.
Nothing to do. From that moment Gennaro makes nostos, the return to the identity and managerial path traced by a century of family experience on and with the sea, his personal, professional and business way out, together with his father Gianfranco, his family and his uncles with whom he shared the inauguration, 10 years ago in Rossano Scalo, of the first successful local experience of a fish shop with cooking. Which was also another evolution of the Minichedd: from the direct fishing of the great-grandfather to the sale of the catch with the grandfather in the municipal fish shop, from the opening of his own fish shop Il Gambero to the wholesale of the father and his brothers on board the Santissima Achiropita , we arrived, in fact, at gastronomy and the direct use of fresh fish, displayed in shop windows, as the main ingredient of what was soon perceived as a real culinary experience and once again an identity-building experience.
Gennaro was immediately at the forefront of the fresh food processing laboratory and began to try his hand at cooking. And with the other foot he continues to travel, to train, to compare and to be inspired by experiences of seafood gastronomy that identify different territories, regions and countries and which, from Normandy to Puglia, each capable of reinterpreting history and trends, provide him with stimuli and suggestions, sense of return and confidence in the future, memory and audacity.
Until the conception and birth of MiNiKə, natural and legitimate heir of those 100 years of history, passion, courage, innovation, tradition, family and business consolidated with that same sea which for the Minichedds – Free man you will always love the sea wrote Baudelaire – is always been a source of life, wealth, freedom and social experimentation.
With MiNiKə, therefore, at least for now, a historical parable is completed, which began a century ago with great-grandfather Rosario, on board the gozzi towards Taranto: that is, we return towards the sea, to Lido Sant’Angelo, a contemporary offshoot of an entire area which for centuries and centuries, with the remains of the Fondaco and the Torre Stellata together with the ancient quay of which underwater traces resurface, testify to the ancient and glorious maritime history, often forgotten, of Rossano, today merged into the largest city in Calabria : Corigliano-Rossano.
Accompanying Gennaro Scorza on this journey which will remain closely linked to the success of the Fish Market with Cooking in Via Ludovico Adimari in Rossano Scalo will not surprisingly also be the young professionals trained in the Professional Hotel Institute of the Majorana Comprehensive Education Institute of Corigliano-Rossano, which in recent years has become a hotbed and exemplary beacon of training and innovation oriented towards identity management.
