Massimo bottura

One of the best things you see inside the door of Massimo Bottura’s restaurant, Osteria Francescana, in Modena, Italy, is a self-portrait of the artist Joseph Beuys posing like a stand-in for the Sundance Kid; the inscription at the bottom, in Italian, says, “We are the revolution.”

He has been a force in a culinary revolution for years now, but not necessarily in a way that ignites sweeping movements. Chefs like Ferran Adrià and René Redzepi have influenced thousands of acolytes (and copycats), but Bottura’s handwork is of a more private and idiosyncratic strain: He cooks food that’s about Italy and family and history and memory and art, yes, but ultimately his eclectic platings and flavor combinations reflect the miasmic workings of his own mind.

one of the first matters you see inner the door of Massimo Bottura’s restaurant, Osteria Francescana, in Modena, Italy, is a self-portrait of the artist Joseph Beuys posing like a stand-in for the Sundance Kid; the inscription at the bottom, in Italian, says, “We are the revolution.”