Address: 5th Avenue, Brixton Village, SW9 8PS
Telephone: 078 7294 5675
Email: bellantonis@yahoo.co.uk
Website: http://www.bellantonis.co.uk/Cookery_Classes.html
I’ve just eaten one of the best meals I’ve had in Brixton. And I cooked it myself – sort of. “Sort of” because I cooked it under the guidance of chef Dario Bellantoni, at one of the courses he runs at his restaurant in Brixton Village. His aim is to help you to create the pleasures of Italian home cooking by teaching you how to make and roll by hand pasta dishes, to use seasoning, to cook sauces and to improve food presentation.
Dario comes from Liguria in northern Italy, so this is his style of cooking; simple with the accent on flavour. He told me that much of his approach to cooking was handed down by his grandmother; so now it’s been passed onto me.
One thing he emphasises is the integrity of the ingredients that he uses. Some come direct from his own sources in Italy but he also buys locally, such as the fish from Brixton Market. It’s also noteworthy, from the point of view of the amateur cook, that everything he does can be done at home. I was amazed to find that all his cooking is done in a space smaller than that of most home kitchens, with just a domestic oven and a four ring hob.
The course lasted around three hours but in that time we prepared four dishes, totally from scratch.
EATINBRIXTON 