Kathmandu:

Giuseppe Silverstri is many things — Head Chef at Harrods, London, Lady Diana’s personal chef, Ambassador of Italian Cuisine, world’s best pizza maker 2005. He has a number of other awards to his name. However, he says, “I prefer to be known a good chef.” Chef Silverstri is in Kathmandu to raise funds for the Disabled Human Rights Centre (DHRC), an NGO working for human rights of disabled people. He hosted a two-day cookery show at Silver Mountain School of Hotel Management and another is planned for September 27 at Roadhouse Café. DHRC is planning to organise a 14-day trek for 12 disabled Nepali people next September. The funds collected from the programme will go towards financing the trek.

Chef Silvestri’s signature cuisines are Linguine with Lobster, and Risotto with Prawns. “Ravioli Caprese in particular is my favourite which originated from my home Island of Capri, Italy,” he says. Apart from the delicious dishes he prepares, he is famous for having been Princess Di’s chef. “She was a simple lady like any other lady,” he says of the late princess. He was her chef for nine months, after which he moved to Harrods. Recalling his visit to London nine years ago, he says, “Local restaurants then garnished their food awkwardly to impress their clients. These were bad in taste.” Well, now London has got a master chef!

“If I had were not a chef, I would be doing something for people — either working in theatres to make people smile, or maybe a photographer.” He plans to visit more cookery schools in Kathmandu in 10 years doing similar shows to raise funds to help the needy and bring a smile to their faces. “People smiles are of more value than anything,” he says. How was he lured into becoming a chef? “I was a born chef,” he says. He started cooking at the age of 11 during

summer/winter vacations. For him cooking is a fascination. “Whenever I enter my kitchen, it seems like I am entering it for the first time.” The chef dreams of opening a club for chefs.

Having tasted 22 Nepali dishes, Chef Silvestri is taken in by our cuisine and “momo” is his latest favourite dish.

On his day off, he visits the market looking for new ingredients as “you have to be always attentive about what you are doing and what you are going to do the next day”. He always begins a new day by asking the 120 chefs working under him, “How are you?” And if anyone says s/he is not fine, he sends that person home to be fine as he believes that a person’s mood flavour the food s/he is preparing. It is hard to believe no one in his family wanted him to take up this profession. He says his father did not talk with him for a month when he pursued his passion. All the better for the world’s foodies. In him we have one of the greatest chefs.