Adriano Rampazzo - Locked Down Life in Brazil

Adriano Rampazzo's Lockdown Life

Our Signature Dishes illustrator has been catching up on Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire box sets, playing his old vinyl and cooking, cooking, cooking!

Like a lot of us in lock down, Adriano Rampazzo has loved food and has worried over politics. The Brazilian-born artist and chef, worked and trained in London, before returning to São Paulo, Brazil to work as an illustrator.

Brazil, along with the USA and UK, is one of the three countries that has suffered the highest death toll from Corona Virus.

In the lead up to its publication last year, Rampazzo had been working hard on the beautiful, detailed pictures in our book Signature Dishes That Matter. This year, work has been somewhat harder to find, though he's been keeping busy recreating the dishes he illustrated for our book.

"Considering what’s going on, I’m doing fine. I’ve got my health, and my family is also healthy," he tells us. "I’ve been cooking loads! Every single day I’m make at least something, and sometimes I’ll spend many many hours in the kitchen making different things simultaneously.

"Pickling radishes and cucumbers, making big batches of sauces; I made some labneh for the first time, a few kinds of sushi, many different pasta dishes, tonkatsu sandwich, fried chicken sandwich and what have you.

   

Peking Duck, Bianyfang, China 1827
Peking Duck, Bianyfang, China 1827

"With the leftover buttermilk from the labneh I’ll make some American southern style fried chicken. Let’s see how that goes! So from the cooking point of view, the lockdown has been really productive.

 

Lobster Jelly with Cauliflower, Caviar, and Crispy Seaweed Waffles, Richard Ekkebus, Amber, China, 2005
Lobster Jelly with Cauliflower, Caviar, and Crispy Seaweed Waffles, Richard Ekkebus, Amber, China, 2005

"I have also been drawing, surely, but a lot less than I’d like to. I’ve been busier with other home affairs. Besides cooking, I’ve been taking care of the plants, reading a lot, watching films and series. I watched Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire so far. (Very into the Mafia game at the moment!) and taking care of my vinyl collection. But I must say the productiveness pretty much ends here.

 

Spherical-I Green Olives, Ferran Adrià and Albert Adrià, elBulli, Spain, 2005
Spherical-I Green Olives, Ferran Adrià and Albert Adrià, elBulli, Spain, 2005

"My daily routine hasn’t changed that much because I already work at home, but I’m really missing my Aikido classes. I was supposed to have my black belt exam last month (May). Hopefully we will be able to get back to training later on this year. "On a broader sense, it is quite hard to be in Brazil at the present time. . . On this side of the coin, it is very difficult to be optimistic. It is really sad to see my country delve so deep..."

 

Pizza with Smoked Salmon and Caviar, Wolfgang Puck, Spago, United States 1982
Pizza with Smoked Salmon and Caviar, Wolfgang Puck, Spago, United States 1982

To see all of Adriano's pictures get a copy of Signature Dishes That Matter, a global celebration of the iconic restaurant dishes that defined the course of culinary history over the past 300 years. Curated by experts and organized chronologically, it's both a landmark cookbook and a fascinating cultural history of dining out. Buy it here.

 

Signature Dishes That Matter
Signature Dishes That Matter