Tomorrow’s catering in hundreds of events

As well as presenting the industry’s latest products and machinery, this year’s edition of HostMilano will also include over 500 events in all three macro areas,  major award schemes, show-cooking displays, master classes and workshops.
The area devoted to food service has always been the heart of HostMilano, flanked as it is by the Bread, Pasta and Pizza section. A prominent place is taken up by A.P.C.I., the Professional Association of Italian Chefs, with Objective: Apprenticeship, a training project run in conjunction with A.M.P.I. (the Academy of Italian Master Pastry Chefs), F.I.P.E.
, the Italian cuisine association Le Soste and Womentech (the Women in Technology Association). The protagonists here will be the most talented youngsters coming out of professional schools, chosen through a lengthy selection process that ended in April in the “A BIT of Taste” space at BIT, the International Tourism Fair, and who will now battle it out in the final challenge at HostMilano. The prize is an apprenticeship in top kitchens in Italy and abroad. The young cooks will set about their task before an audience of professionals (chefs, restaurateurs, heads of major hotel chains and purchasing groups), who will then single out those they find to show the most promise, and take them off to be trained up in their organisations. The National #APCI Chef Italia Team will also be present, with five days of show-cooking events featuring top chefs, VIP guests, tastings and debates. Joined by the national and foreign A.P.C.I. delegations, it will give a detailed presentation of regional cuisine, complete with actual cooking displays. There will also be a series of talks, held in collaboration with Lavoro & Turismo, for professionals seeking new openings. It will be an opportunity for them to meet some of the leading players in today’s hotel and catering sector.

Machinery and other equipment used in kitchens and cooking laboratories will be the focus of attention at Identità Future, the space organised by Identità Golose at HostMilano. With everything from cooking receptacles and coffee machines to blast chillers and the very latest induction hobs on show, this event will illustrate the valuable contribution technology makes to the work of chefs and ice cream or pastry cooks, who will themselves be on hand to show how procedures can be carried out much more quickly and with the least effort. “The aim is is to highlight all the new technologies now available which can do things that until now have been, if not impossible, then extremely complicated,” says the head of Identità Golose Paolo Marchi.

Chefs belonging to the CHIC (Charming Italian Chef) Association, will be at HostMilano with their brand Chic Respect, as promoters of a cuisine that is sustainable, safeguarding human health and the environment. The green approach in all aspects of top-end catering will be analysed, from production and preparation, to sales and consumption, with attention to reducing waste and fostering ethically correct consumer practices.

The Bread, Pasta and Pizza area will see the return of the European Pizza , organised by the magazine Pizza e Pasta Italiana and involving over 60 pizza makers from all over Europe. The event will of course be singing the praises of pizza napoletana and the health benefits of Italy’s most popular national dish abroad.

Pillole di Primo Piatto (“First-course Tips”) will also be back this year. These free, single-theme seminars on the various aspects of the professional world of pasta are organised by A.P.Pa.Fre. (the Association of Small and Medium-sized Manufacturers of Fresh Pasta) in collaboration with PRIMO PIATTO – Pasta School. This third edition will put the spotlight on new techniques and technologies for first-course dishes and will be entitled Il Pastaio 4.0.

Catering to the ever-growing demand for gluten-free foodstuffs, the Lombardy section of the Italian Coeliac Association (AIC) will be presenting the app it has developed to help celiac consumers, along with show-cooking displays and tastings of gluten-free products, run in collaboration with the Chefs Association for Milan and its Province at a single stand. The latter, headed by Master Chef Giovanni Priolo, is preparing a series of initiatives and practical demonstrations illustrating the wealth of traditional Italian cuisine along with “old” ingredients and ancient grains, an extremely valuable heritage that can take us towards a healthier future.

A whole range of events offering updates on technical advances, new legislation and market trends will be available in the ANIMA space, presenting state-of-the-art Italian technology and professional information from the associations representing food technology associations, from manufacturers of slicing and mincing machines, to those for cold storage, espresso coffee machines, bar equipment and household articles.
The Foodservice Consultants Society International (FCSI), meanwhile, will be offering some detailed and authoritative “Insights into the Catering of the Future”. This continues the joint efforts being made by HostMilano and the FCSI to bring together consultants for the design, management and organisation of services in the hotel and professional catering sector, with some useful words of advice on how to tackle the new consumer desire for dining experiences and social relations.