13 years ago Simone Rugiati used to labour over a hot stove, teaching an audience that was not familiar with stars and signature dishes, how to make the perfect soffritto (lightly fried mixture of chopped onions, carrots and celery, TN). « I – so Simone – go on television to enable people to cook at home. The rest is show. Showing the big audience how the dish of a star-decorated chef is created is a pure style exercise, to lure people into restaurants. In fact, in order to replicate some recipes, one needs the skill that can only be acquired after years of hard work and training, plus, you also need hard-to-find raw materials ». On the social networks, on the contrary, he has only recently started, but he is already very successful (almost 300 thousand followers on Instagram and aver 500 thousand on Facebook), so much so, that he is considered to be an influencer. «I was one of the last in my sector to have a social network profile, I opened it, so that those who used to follow me on TV could get to know me better. Over time, I organized myself, and now there’s agency that cooperates with me. The social networks are a large pool, where I can capture the needs of the audience, but also test the products stemming from my collaborations, or interact with my followers. On TV, I often treat the topics that my followers suggest to me ». What is needed to complete Simone’s professional path is only a restaurant. «Many investors –Rugiati goes on – ask me to open a restaurant, but I still have to grow, plus, in life, one cannot do too many things at the same time. A chef, in my opinion, must be in kitchen, and I have other priorities at the moment». Meanwhile, Simone is developing the supply chain that, in the future, will serve his restaurant. Indeed, Foodloft (Rugiati factory house) is among the partners of “Coltivatori di Emozioni”, the platform that aims to bring consumers closer to the farming activities, involving them in the productive cycle, by “adopting” a crop among olives, grapevines, bee-hives and wheat. Another goal of Coltivatori di Emozioni is the reclaiming and valorisation of fallow lands in Apulia, Sicily, Calabria, Molise, Marche, Lombardy, Tuscany, Piedmont and Veneto.
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