Kathmandu :

Rubiolo Battista known as Robi comes from northern Italy and has introduced the flavours of his part of the world to Nepal and has shown Italian food is more than just pizzas and pastas.

Like the Maiale Tonnato from Piemonte, a starter made from a fine slice of meat smothered in a tuna and caper sauce made memorable with garlic. One taste is never enough.

Or you can begin with the Bruschetta Con Mozzarella, which is homemade bread flavoured with a woody taste from the wood oven and is covered with a sharp tomato paste gentled with Nepal-made Mozzarella cheese. A gamut of tastes run through the mouth. Robi says, “It started as a poor man’s food — just bread, olive oil, garlic. Now it is delicious and luxurious.”

Or you can have the Minestrone soup. Robi’s version is the most original I’ve had. It is made with beans, potatoes, flour, tomatoes and co-mes close to Minestrone served in Geneoa, made with haricot beans and vegetables in 17th century. Minestrone’s were created to give home-coming sailors much needed sustenance from vegetables.

Of the main courses, try the Pollo Alla Diavola which translates as the devil’s chicken as it’s got a lot of garlic and pepper to make it satanically hot without removing the fresh taste of chicken. It’s actually Italian roast chicken but the pepper-ness separates it from anything you’ve had before.

I love the Tagliatelle al pesto, a pasta dish going back to turn of 16th century when a nobleman created flat ribbon pasta called Tagliatelle ‘inspired’ by the beautiful but deadly Lucrezia Borgia’s hair. The pesto made from ba-sil, cheese, nuts and gro-und in a mortar-pestle (thus pesto) is lightly tossed in egg pasta.

As you eat it, sharpness and smo-othness are perfectly balanced, and Lucrezia Borgia lives spicily and tartly again.

The Italian word cartoccio means covered and the Trota al Cartoccio is trout served, wrapped in foil. It comes cooked with finely sliced potatoes, the taste is heightened with capers and olive oil. “Like me, it comes from the North and is very rare because you don’t get much fish there.” Light as a mist with taste as a silver lining, the trout calls for seconds.

In France, it’s called a Chicken Chasseur and is a sauce, in Italy it’s Chicken Cacciatore or hunter’s chicken. It has about 15 condiments. Robi uses most of them and balances the piquant tomatoes with a light touch of capsicum so that the chicken and the mushrooms have an elusive taste.

When you go home, you must take with you the lingering taste of the Zuccoto which is shaped and named after an Italian bishop’s skull cap. It’s decadently, sinfully delicious combining chocolate and vanilla ice-cream, raisins, rum and strawberry liquor. “You don’t get it much in Italy any more,” says Robi.

But I suspect all the tastes in Nuovo Marcopolo are rare, original and Robi’s own delicious variations. Call 4413724.