Gucci Osteria da Massimo Bottura

Dishes mentioned

• Schiacciata Toscana

  Wow, don't take this away from me. This schiacciata has arrogance, character — beautifully ignorant. The dough is first fried, then dried in an electric oven, and finally finished on the grill. It's perfect: crunchy on the outside, soft and moist inside. The crumb is amazing. The intuition to pass it over the coals at the end is spectacular. It's something new even for me. It sits somewhere between schiacciata, pizza, and a bit of puccia. At the base there's a truffle mayonnaise, then thinly sliced spalla cotta from Cinta Senese, pecan nuts in vinegar, Camembert from Cascina Casinella near Cremona, and honey from Casa Maria Luigia. Every bite gets better. The Camembert really pushes, and the pecan with vinegar is incredible. If you think about it, this is more of a schiacciata than any of the others we've tried — it goes back to the origins, when Romans cooked dough directly on coals. Cost is €27, which includes amuse-bouche, the schiacciata, and small pastries. For the location in Piazza della Signoria at Gucci Osteria, it's a fantastic price. I give it five schiacciate out of five.

• Pane Guttiau with Alganori
• Finto Espresso

Dishes mentioned

• Cannolo Siciliano Salato

  This is a savory cannolo that reproduces an Italian breakfast in a very elegant, salty way. Inside there's the taste of grandma's ragù. It looks like an espresso until the very last moment — amazing.

• Schiacciata di Gucci Osteria

  This schiacciata has a three-cook dough: first fried, then baked, then finished on the grill. Inside there's a seasonal vegetable mayonnaise with a bit of San Miniato truffle, a spalla cotta Cinta Senese, a dark lake prawn, and a honey from Casa Maria Luigia. Few ingredients but all right — it's made really well. The funny thing is that as a Tuscan, I've never found a schiacciata with these ingredients, this combination. They managed to bring schiacciata to a Michelin star level without making it clash with the elegant context.

• Risotto allo Zafferano senza Riso (Crema di Topinambur e Zafferano)
• Pappardelle al Cinghiale con Arancia Bruciata

  The pasta is very thin and elastic, almost like ramen, with a light, aromatic, umami-rich wild boar ragù made from the bones. It's finished with burnt orange. The perfume is candied orange. The pasta has perfect chew, the cooking enhances the orange with the wild boar incredibly. It's amazing how Taka works with so few elements but the result is complex, harmonious in the mouth, and never obvious. I also love how they cooked the fresh pasta almost al dente to enhance the chew and focus more on the sauce and burnt orange.

Dishes mentioned

• Sogno di Cacciucco

  This is the classic Livornese dish deconstructed. The broth is served separately with parsley oil and basil, to sip between each bite. What happens is very interesting: every single bite eaten on its own has its own personality, but once you sip the broth it brings you back to the classic Livornese dish.

• Zafferano con Topinambur e Cervello Fritto

  This course takes us to San Miniato where they produce saffron. We find saffron with Jerusalem artichoke accompanied by fried brain. In this course the textures are very gentle, but the flavor that stands out absolutely is that of the saffron.

• Macchia Limitrofa a Grosseto

  Porcini mushrooms, olives, sorapa, beetroot foam. I'm really curious. The first thing that struck me about this dish, more than the flavors and aromas of the scrubland, were the textures. The crunchy celery that reminds me of dry twigs snapping underfoot, and then you get the scent of the mushroom, the slightly earthy component of the beetroot. Very deep.

• Tre Porcellini

  The main is porchetta. The meat melts in your mouth like butter, then it goes under the shoulder accompanied by a celery puree, but the Sangiovese stands out on the palate. Finally, ravioli with pork and shrimp. They almost seem like dim sum, both in terms of the dough and the filling.

• Parella con Fondo di Ossa e Cinghiale e Arancia Bruciata

  This is more than diaphragmatic: the carbohydrate, the parella with bone and wild boar stock and burnt orange.

Dishes mentioned

• Tuscan Schiacciata

  This schiacciata is triple-cooked: first fried to puff up, then dried in an electric oven, and finally finished on the grill. The fillings are smoked cooked shoulder and Cinta Senese pork, with raw-milk Cavamberta cheese and Caci a Lago Scuro, plus honey from Casa Maria Luigia. The cheese is incredibly bold, melting and smoky, with the grill flavor carrying through the whole sandwich. The acidity from the pecan nuts and mayonnaise cuts through, but then the sweet honey takes over. It's perfect, absolutely perfect.

Dishes mentioned

• Tuna Temakinho

  Tuna Temakinho. Do you fly very high? Oh God, this is happiness. This is the way to end this Ein Prosit with a bang. Something tells me we were right to move on from this dinner.

• Pork Belly

  My favorite Japanese dish: pork belly. Break my egg. It flies away like the Pretty Woman mussel, which wasn't a mussel, by the way. We won't make any rankings but what we ate at this dinner, guys, was one of the best things ever, really.

Dishes mentioned

• Cannolo con Ragù di Chianina, Ricotta di Bufala e Pistacchio

  This cannolo is incredible. I want 50 of them. The temperature is perfect, and the detail on the side with the orange zest, just like a Sicilian cannolo, and the other side with the pistachio crumble. It's really good. I want another one.

• Espresso Italiano con Brodo di Fagioli Neri e Spuma di Caffè

  This is a great idea. It's disorienting in the best sense. In the mouth, the coffee is there, not the full flavor, but the sensation of drinking a coffee. Then the oil coats your mouth and lips. I think it's even better than coffee. If I woke up in the morning and had this... I'd have it with scrambled eggs and bread. Imagine that.

• Pralina di Cioccolato Fondente, Fegatino di Pollo e Jelly di Pera

  This is elegant. Really elegant. You could serve this at the end of a meal, as a chocolate. I love liver, and if you close with this, you've won. Liver and chocolate have been tried many times, but here the balance of the chocolate around it is wonderful. This is high-level pastry. I'd see it at the end.

• Coda di Rospo con Purea di Porro, Ventresca di Tonno, Uova di Salmone e Cetriolo, Capasanta con Cannolicchi e Mandorle della Maremma, Brodo di Cacciucco

  The dish is beautiful. I'm going to say something heavy: do they sell it? I'm taking it home tonight. The pairing is amazing. This is the best meat dish I've ever eaten. Only a Japanese chef who came here could do this, not an Italian who went there. The use of ginger is very wise compared to other places where it's too dominant. I'd buy a half-liter bottle of this broth if they sold it.

• Crema di Topinambur allo Zafferano, Midollo di Vitello, Cervello di Vitello Fritto con Salsa al Levistico

  This is madness. Calm down, but I'm not calm. How good is this? Spread this on the bread. The creaminess of the brain, there's wasabi too. This touches at least three continents: Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. The brain treated like this is fantastic. Before you finish, take a sip of the orange wine. It feels like something I would have eaten at Orfali Brothers. This is real fine dining. It gives me the feeling I had at Savage. He's doing whatever the hell he wants, and he's doing it beautifully. This is a three-star dish.