Col’Cacchio Pizzeria is running the second Celebrity Chef series from this month onwards, for the next six months, once again linking a celebrity chef to a pizza once a month, but this time around, a country is linked to the chef as well, in honour of the World Cup.
Interestingly, despite FIFA’s strict ambush marketing rules, the Col’Cacchio newsletter ‘grazie!’ is initially shy in referring to the “World Cup”, yet has a box in the newsletter that states boldly: “The perfect place to gather pre, post or during the 2010 FIFA WORLD CUP… We take the hassle out of organising your soccer party”!
This month chef Michael Broughton of Terroir in Stellenbosch, a Top 10 restaurant, is representing Italy with his Michelangelo pizza, containing an interesting mix of figs, potato, garlic braised rocket, fontina cheese, parma ham, a drizzle of truffle oil, and fresh origanum.
In May another Top 10 chef, David Higgs of Rust en Vrede in Stellenbosch, will represent Mexico with his Nacho Libre pizza, containing ‘jerk spiced chicken breast strips, home-made guacamole, freshly chopped tomato chilli salsa, fresh coriander & sour cream’.
In June Jodi-Ann Pearton of The Food Design Agency, a catering company, food consultancy and cookery school in Johannesburg, represents South Africa with a Bunny Chow Calzone, which is a folded pizza containing tandoori chicken and tomato chow, served with fresh coriander and Mrs Ball’s chutney.
The names of the gourmet pizzas that the chefs will present in July – September have not yet been released, but the names of the chefs and the countries they will represent are available. Franck Dangereux, owner of The Foodbarn, and a previous Top 10 chef whilst at La Colombe, is the gourmet pizza chef in July and represents France. Chef Nicky Gibbs, from The Westcliff hotel in Johannesburg, will represent Argentina in her gourmet pizza in August. In September Top 10 chef Chantel Dartnall, who came second in the Eat Out Top 10 restaurant awards in November, of Restaurant Mosaic in Pretoria, will represent Denmark.
For every gourmet pizza sold at R 95, R 5 of the price goes to the Children’s Hospital Trust, the fundraising charity of the Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital, and to its Burns’ Unit in particular. Last year Col’Cacchio ran a similar Celebrity Chef promotion, and the R 120 000 which was raised was donated to the Hospital for the purchase of specialised surgical equipment for the new operating theatre.
Col’Cacchio has eight franchise outlets in the Cape, including Franschhoek, Stellenbosch, Camps Bay, Canal Walk, Cavendish, Willowbridge and Blouberg, as well as eight outlets in Gauteng and one in KwaZulu-Natal.
For more details about Col’Cacchio’s Celebrity Chef series, see www.colcacchio.co.za
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com