New York City:- The Italian Culinary Academy of New York City, whose founder is Dorothy Cann Hamilton and dean is GVCI member Cesare Casella will play a prominent role in the next International Day of Italian Cuisines and they are full steam working on this event (read more on the ICA participation here).

AUSTRALIA:- "The Adelaide Review" magazine has published an article on the Grupo Virtuale Cuochi Italiani (GVCI) called "The Great Debate". Written by GVCI member chef Salvatore Pepe who explains the dynamics of this unique virtual group of cooks and how it works: debating, sharing and exchanging experiences and opinions. But most of all, as a standard of authentic Italian cuisine. Also, more information on the upcoming International Day of Italian Cuisines. Click here to read the whole article.

An Italian Food and Wine magazine (Italia a Tavola) launched a few weeks ago an online survey to find out who has been the Italian gastronomy personality of 2009. Online polls are not scientific measurements, but give dome sort of insight of what people broadly think. Someone added Mario Caramella, GVCI President, among the candidates, something that must be seen as of the times. This is the result of: 1. Mario has been clearly indicated as the representative of chefs and culinary professionals who work outside of Italy, in particular the members of the GVCI network,  2. this "category" is now respected as a vital part of the Italian gastronomy as a whole. With the addition of Mario to this survey, the importance of the virtual 21st culinary Italian region (the world)step further on the long road that the Group of Italian professionals belonging to GVCI have taken finally is appreciated at grassroots’ level. It is a in the, now distant, 2001. For this reason we invite all our readers – particularly those leaving outside Italy – to vote the GVCI President in this poll. Voting Mario Caramella is a way to support the cause of promoting and preserving authentic and quality Italian Cuisine around the world as well as to reward the efforts of hundreds of hospitality professionals committed to it: exactly as we do with this website, as each single itchefs-GVCI associate does, as we all together did in the extraordinary Hong Kong Italian Cuisine Summit in last October. It is only a poll, we know it, however, as we have said, it is a sign of the times. So, since there are only a few days before its closing, let’s all do what we can to bring Mario and the GVCI in the first places. Whatever will be the outcome, in a sense, we have already won considering the number of votes that Mario had to date. We have already won because after this poll there will be more people in Italy and worldwide supporting our initiatives, starting with the next International Day of Italian Cuisines, the next January 17, 2010. Vote for Mario Caramella, vote for the GVCI and it’s unique history, on http://www.italiaatavola.net/sondaggio

Beijing: GVCI associate chef Vincenzo Pezzilli, formerly Executive Chef of Piazza Italia in Beijing, is now the Chief Operating Officer of Agrilandia, an organic farm that has recently started its activities in the Chinese capital. Agrilandia has various operations revolving around the farm, among which are the Casale restaurants located inside the farm itself and in the Chinese Academy of Fine Arts, plus 2 pilot ministores for a potential franchising.  Chef Pezzilli aims at creating a pole of Italian cuisine excellence in Northern China, which may continue what Piazza Italia begun but wasn´t, unfortunately, able to do so due to management flaws.

Donato De Santis’ Villa della Pasta, a program aired by El Gourmet Channel in South America, was awarded the Martin Fierro prize as the Best Cooking Show of the Season (2008). This is the highest recognition of Argentinean television and is the second time Donato has been honored with this award (the first one was for his program Donato Cucina in 2002). Villa Della Pasta, is a program where De Santis reveals his audience the secrets in the making of the best handmade Italian pasta.

Salumeria Rosi is a small, neighborhood salumi shop and restaurant. The Salumeria is located in New York City's Upper West Side and offers a wide variety of traditional Italian cured meats to be enjoyed on the spot or taken to go.

The Rosi family has produced high-quality salumi in Italy for generations. They are as passionate about pork as they are tradition. One year ago they teamed up with Chef Cesare Casella - Italian chef per eccellenza - to create a special menu of prepared-foods and dishes, typically found in salumerie across Italy. Now, a year has passed since they opened its doors. Happy 1st Birthday!!!

The dish of the next International Day of Italian Cuisines (IDIC) will be Tagliatelle al ragù alla bolognese.  Hundreds of Italian chefs around the world will repeat on January 10th 2010 the ola of the last two years, when the dishes to be celebrated and protected were Carbonara and Risotto alla Milanese. The announcement was made during the last Italian Cuisine Asia Summit, during the Industry Workshop on “Italian Cuisine in Asia: the next 20 years”. Tagliatelle al ragù, originally and icon of the city of Bologna and its surroundings, is by now one of the most popular dishes of Italian Cuisine and therefore the most counterfeited around the world. “We want to let Italian food lovers all around the world know how to cook and enjoy a quality authentic tagliatelle al ragù which, in the majority of the cases, has nothing to do with the awful, wrongly called ´bolognaise sauces`”, says Bali based GVCI’s President Mario Caramella. The International Day of Italian Cuisines is born out of the mission of both educating worldwide consumers to enjoy authentic and quality Italian cuisine and protecting their right to get what they pay for when going to eateries labelled as “Italian”. Organized by itchefs-gvci.com the International Day of Italian Cuisines promises to be an exciting and successful world wide event, as the last two editions were.

CHINA - people are still talking about the Italian Cuisine Asia Summit. The South China Morning Post has covered the event and published the article "Master chefs keep Italy on the culinary map" together with a video on the Summit.

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Buenos Aires. A network of 38 Italian Restaurants, based in the capital of Argentina and its province, has just been created. Leaded by TV celebrity chef (and GVCI member) Donato De Santis, the network aims at increasing quality and genuineness in the establishments that serve so-called Italian Cuisine. The Italian cultural heritage left by hundred of thousands migrants is still alive, despite it’s almost a century since the last wave arrived, but the quality and authenticity of Italian cuisine in Argentina are quite low. For this reason another good news is the advertising campaign just launched by one of the oldest Argentine pasta maker, Matarazzo, of clear Italian roots. The campaign “Vivi la Vida al dente” (“Live your life al dente”), projected by Liebre Amotinada Ideas agency and aired by TV and radio, is quite a revolutionary initiative for a country where pasta is eaten almost mushy.

New York - Odette Fada, talented chef and GVCI’s associate, is back to the front line at the helm of the SD26 the re-born San Domenico Restaurant. The new creation of Tony May, an Italian Cuisine trend setter in the Big Apple, is located in 19 E 26th Street, near Madison Square Park. Fada and May are determined to refresh the image of the old restaurant, which according to the critics was good but “not especially exciting”. They aim at appealing younger customers in a district where the competition is strong: very close to SD26 there are well established restaurants such as Tabla and A Voce. But Odette and Tony are confident that their new proposal of quality and surprising Italian Cuisine will be appreciated by their customers. In bocca al lupo, Odette.

Happy cows aren’t on Facebook, The Lone Tuscan rides again, Splish Splash, are just some of the hilarious posts you may find on Italian Cooking in the loop, the blogspot run by Gvci’s and New York based Cesare Casella, Chef Patron of Salumeria Rosi in New York’s Upper West Side and Dean of Italian Culinary Insititute of the Big Apple.

Children’s Day, last Sunday in Chile, and GVCI Roberto Illari, chef patron of Bel Paese Restaurant, in Santiago, organized a special celebration. Games, fun, a cooking class and plenty of Italian food in entertaining shapes, for his little guests. Funny Pennette al sugo, hilarious lasagne and flying cotoletta alla Milanese. Children’s cusine of excellent quality. Watch the photos here.

Bel Paese Restaurant

The kids showing their final plates

After 5 years at the Jumeirah Beach Hotel, in which he was also the Chef de Cuisine at the Italian Restaurant Carnevale, Andrea Strim is now the Executive Sous Chef of al Burj Al Arab, the 7-star super luxury Hotel. From September 1^st, Susy Massetti, after leaving the Sas Radisson Hotel in Bahrain, where she was Executive chef, will come back to the Sheraton Hotel and Resort.

A Master class on Italian Semifreddo was recently held by the chefs Vincenzo Pezzilli (director) and Maurizio Lai at the Boscolo Etoile Academy in Beijing’s Piazza Italia complex. The “Istituto Superiore Arti Culinarie Boscolo Etoile” was founded in 1985 by Rossano Boscolo, a veteran of the hotel, restaurant and pastry business. Currently Rossano is not only the president of the Academy but he also runs the Boscolo Hotel together with his brothers.
Piazza Italia started the cooking school to teach Italian Cuisine lovers how to cook, however the Etoile Academy is also based on the idea that whatever a customer sees and tastes in Piazza Italia, he or she can also buy, including their recipes.

Maurizio Lai

Pezzilli and assistant making semifreddo

Word to the wise: If Francesco Farris asks you to dinner at his 1940s Bluffview bungalow, say yes, cancel everything and get there as fast as you can.
When it comes to entertaining, Mr. Farris, executive chef at Arcodoro & Pomodoro in Dallas, does not cut corners. His impromptu, everyday dinners are legendary. And on a perfect Monday night in early spring, with birds in the trees and the temperature hitting 80 degrees, Mr. Farris, a native Sardinian, lit his cigarette, let it dangle from his mouth and began cooking for his handful of guests.