Food 

Carpaccio

In 1950, when Giuseppe Cipriani, the owner of famous Venetian Harry’s Bar, was hearkening to countess Amalia Nani Mocenigo’s crying, whose personal doctor had forbidden her eating cooked meat, he, Giuseppe Cipriani, might hardly suppose that the dish he invented would become a real Italian classic in a couple of years (by the way, a strange doctor was that of countess Mocenigo’s, wasn’t he?!) The Cipriani’s solution was brilliantly simple: to slice raw beef and support it with an appetizing sauce. But if with the beef it's all flat and plain and the details are not to be discussed for long (lean loin sliced across fibres), the recipe of the classical sauce can vary. As eye-witnesses evidence, in that memorable evening Cipriani prepared it from mayonnaise, lemon juice, horse-radish and milk. Dozens years later, his son, Arrigo Cipriani, gives another formula in his book “The Harry's Bar Cookbook”: mayonnaise, Worcestershire sauce, lemon juice, milk, salt, newly-ground pepper.

A few words about the etymology. The birth of the dish coincided with a grandiose exhibition of Venetian painter Vittorio Carpaccio (1460-1525). I think it was exactly the exhibition that gave the name to the dish, and not the special love of Carpaccio to the combination of red and white colours, as some researchers-gastronomes attribute it to him. Even if red was met in Carpaccio’s works, it prevailed in priests’ garments. On the other hand, red was in sufficient in many Venetian painters' works, for example, in those of Giovanni Bellini (1431-1516), Tiziano Vecellio (1480-1576), Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1676-1770).

Vittorio Carpaccio "Meditation on Christ's Passion",1506

No, the matter isn't in the colour. And cocktail Bellini is in support of it, the author of which the same Giuseppe Cipriani is considered to be. 1948, a great exhibition of Bellini’s works, appearance of the cocktail (one third of fresh peach juice and two thirds of Prosecco; the juice is to be poured first)… Exhibitions – that is the clue. Plus Giuseppe Cipriani’s tastes. It remains only to guess, why other traditional dishes of Harry's Bar, such as shrimp sandwich and scampi all'Armoricaine, were not called Tintoretto and Giorgione. And more about painters: some of American restaurant critics noted patriotically that the crosshatch pattern of the sauce on the Ciprianian carpaccio raise associations with Jackson Pollock’s works.

It is not too hard to understand the reasons of so enthusiastic recognition of dishes and cocktails served at Harry's Bar. Among its regular guests were Ernest Hemingway, Maria Callas, Arturo Toscanini, Guglielmo Marconi, Charlie Chaplin, Baron Philippe de Rothschild, Aga-Khan, Aristotle Onassis, Peggy Guggenheim, Woody Allen, etc, etc, etc. It is not inconceivable that some of the above-listed celebrities met each other exactly at Harry’s Bar, because one of Giuseppe Cipriani’s main rules was especially anxious treatment of solitary guests. He thought, “a customer who comes in alone can always eat, even without a reservation, like he is at home; nobody can send him away” and he always managed to find a vacant table for such a guest, even if the table could sit ten persons. Generous, wise Giuseppe Cipriani!

The time made its amends and added inevitable international interpretations. Don’t be surprised when meet such an embodiment of purism as just beef and olive oil; don’t be surprised at multi-layer compositions either. Being at the restaurant, don't just trust to the text "beef carpaccio", and try to make clear what else will entertain your receptors. For example, I happened to meet variants with Dijon mustard, soy-bean sauce and the like. It is quite difficult to talk of acceptability of these or those combinations, but if the deviation from classics has become a fact, then traditional hard Italian cheeses (Parmigiano Reggiano, Grana Padano, Pecorino staggionato) will not be a disappointment. The same is true for such vegetation ingredient as arugula.

For some adherents of strict oeno-gastronomic compositions (like “red wine = meat”) Arrigo Cipriani’s advice to serve beef carpaccio with a white wine from Friuli, Vintage Tunina by Jermann, may become a revelation. And if someone suspect Arrigo of being prejudiced, I’ll try to widen the range: Pinot Bianco or blends with it (for example, Terre Alte by Livio Felluga, Manna by Franz Haas or Beyond the clouds by Elena Walch) will do, it is not improbable that certain bottles of Greco di Tufo (cru Cutizzi by Feudi di San Gregorio) and Fiano (Cometa by Planeta) will also meet the case.

Returning to the dish (that is, to the way of cooking), it’s high time to say that fresh sea fish and seafood also promise interesting versions of carpaccio. As a rule, an ascetic serving does them especially good. Say, at our osteria there is carpaccio from scampi (langoustine), which contains, apart from the scampi themselves, only olive oil and black caviar. If you have not tried it yet, I recommend it strongly! Why just fish, indeed, let new zucchini to show its best as well! One should only allow one's imagination to play with the sauce, for example, olive oil and drops of Aceto Balsamico di Modena (ideally, of the oldest one - stravecchio). The endless possibility for experiments is exactly what makes carpaccio such a great dish. Endless possibility and unrestricted freedom. Thank you, Mr. Giuseppe Cipriani!

Sergei Gusovsky