Tuscany is a part of the world I felt I was familiar with. I’ve walked the cobbled streets of Siena. I’ve jostled through the overbearing crowds of Florence, craning my neck to take in the wonders of Brunelleschi and his kin while keeping half an eye on my belongings. I’ve been herded, like so many wine pilgrims before me, through the vineyards of Chianti Classico.
Yes, Tuscany is a place I felt I knew quite well.
There’s a real joy, especially in my role as an international purveyor of fine food, drink, hospitality and all the rest, in being proven wrong. As I discovered, Southern Tuscany – in particular, in the environs of The Sense Experience Resort in Follonica, as opposed to the more well-trodden hotspots – is really, really quiet. There’s no real reason to expect it not to be, besides my own clearly misguided associations with travel to the region during the typically cacophonous summer season. Indeed, the resort is a mere 60-minute hop from Pisa, where the masses congregate around a poorly-constructed tower to have their photo taken doing ‘the thing’ with their hands… and yet the tranquility here is palpable.
Notable for being the only five-star hotel along the entire southern Tuscan coastline with its own private beach, and nestled in a nature reserve complete with acres of blooming aromatic herbs and the soporific scream of cicadas, The Sense Experience provides a feeling of sanctuary that many aim for yet few succeed in attaining. It boasts a carefully-curated setup with winning appeal; a small selection of sleekly modernist-inspired villas surround a central courtyard, where a stunning array of cocktails and other refreshments are served. Beyond that in one direction, there are rocks and trees. In the other, the shallow waters of the Mediterranean. Relaxation was almost immediate and ushered along by an excellent negroni – one of Tuscany’s many great gifts to the world – and a good few hours doing as little as possible.
I’d come to Follonica not only to put my feet up amid The Sense Experience’s rather glorious ambience, but also indulge somewhat in the lesser-known parts of Tuscany, and the trip began with a brief sojourn into the nearby town of Massa Marittima. With its honey-coloured buildings constructed over centuries on a series of rolling hills, It’s quintessentially Tuscan yet without the thronging hordes. Not in the mood to battle through crowds of selfie-stick waving tourists in the big city? It’s one of dozens of small towns more or less completely overlooked by the whistle-stop coachloads, and I imagine most want to keep things that way.
At the nearby Enoteco Moris, the laid-back and low-key approach to serving up excellence continued in style. Low-intervention wines, most notably the renowned Vermentino inextricably linked with the region, are leisurely poured alongside wild boar charcuterie and local cheeses amid a truly spectacular landscape. The vintners bring out a panzanella to share; the cucina povera staple of sun-ripened tomatoes, Tropea onions, stale bread and olive oil has long been on my ‘last supper’ menu of favourites – this one, up here in the Tuscan hills and surrounded by a riot of flowering hedgerows, was the best I’ve ever had. It’s worth visiting for that oh-so-simple yet utterly irresistible combo alone.
Back at The Sense Experience, the primary reason for my visit awaited. The newly-opened Eaté restaurant, headed by two Michelin-starred chef Giuseppe Parisi, had been calling my name for some time. While I’ve long been sceptical about restaurants with a view, I think exceptions can and should be made for dining experiences overlooking such pristine stretches of coastline. After all, if you’re crafting food specifically to sing the praises of the region’s nature and the treasures of the sea – and your restaurant happens to be within olive stone-spitting distance of the beach – it would be odd not to set your exclusive singular banqueting table on the sands, with the solstice sun setting beyond the waves.
Before we literally and metaphorically dig into dinner, a brief aside and a small confession, if you will. Despite the platitudes I just sang to panzanella, I’m not – shock, horror – the biggest lover of Italian cuisine as a whole. It’s become so ubiquitous within my lifetime, so impossible to escape in pretty much any high street in the developed world, that I’d grown a little jaded to it. I find all the rules exhausting; the refusal to season bread in this part of the country. The correct sauce to serve with the correct shape of pasta. The endless arguments over what belongs on pizza (exotic fruits introduced in the 17th century, absolutely, categorically, violently not. Tomatoes and chillies, equally exotic and introduced a mere two hundred years earlier? Why, of course!). Make it make sense. What is easy to forget, however, is that the best of Italian cuisine has little to do with all this. It’s about ingredients of phenomenal quality, prepared simply and given the chance to truly shine. When undertaken correctly, and especially in such beautiful surroundings, even the most cynical among us learns to quickly and joyfully shut their mouth.
Back to the table, back to the setting sun and bruising technicolour sky.
Eaté feels at once celebratory and meditative, as all great restaurants should. Our sommelier, Vincent, kicks off proceedings with a cocktail both flavoured with and accompanied by a quintet of the pungent herbs growing the hotel’s extensive (and rather thrillingly re-natured) grounds; a sensory introduction to some of the principal flavours and aromas to expect. The first wine of the evening, a fairly bolshy Vermentino – all big shoulders and high alcohol heat – is served alongside an amuse of sour cherry gazpacho with a singular, wonderfully fat poached prawn from one of Tuscany’s DOP seafood regions. It’s a strong opener, and backs my previous point about simple ingredients being allowed to shout about what they do best; this prawn has an abundance of sweetness and salinity. It tastes like you wish prawns always would.
I’m momentarily disappointed by the arrival of the first course. I was promised oysters, and those who know me are aware I’ll put away raw shucked oysters in quantities that would make the sea lion trainers at SeaWorld blush. The dish arrives with poached oysters, free from their shells and sitting on an emulsion of corn split with a leek and herb reduction. My initial chagrin was more than misplaced – this was the dish of the evening. Subtle hints of sweetness and brine, a velvety sauce, the oysters barely cooked at all but given a few seconds in heat to fatten ever so slightly… oof, it was a winner, and signposted a confident swagger coming from a kitchen that knows the quality of its raw ingredients.
We continue with a pasta primo of tortelli with courgette and almonds – a delicate and highly satisfying reminder that yes, we’re still very much in this part of the Mediterranean – and then onto a hefty hunk of lobster with the playful addition of puffed rice and fennel. More seriously boisterous cookery, albeit one with a meticulous attention to detail and sense of time and place.
Unexpectedly, the runner-up for the title of ‘dish of the evening’ came in the form of a pre-dessert, and once again showcased the whole point of this kind of cooking: to make simple ingredients taste as much like themselves as possible. A carpaccio of strawberries, thinly sliced and given time to rest in a gentle balsamic reduction, delivered an absolutely gigantic thwack of strawberry flavour to the palate – all summertime giddiness and sweetness borne of natural sugars and sunshine. It was glorious. Desserts went by in a bit of a blur, to be honest (we were well into the bottles of Super Tuscan wines by this point), as chocolate-stuffed creations, Turkish delight and some kind of herbaceous marshmallow rounded out proceedings. Midnight on the solstice had fallen, and a double espresso and a meander on the beach was in order.
The Sense Experience resort in Follonica doesn’t have a particularly hard sell on its hands: it’s in possession of a stunning stretch of coastline, a dedicated team with an ongoing vision, and a gastronomic experience worth the relatively short hop from most European capitals. However, with monumental tourist destinations snaffling up all the attention nearby, it can (and should) revel in its hidden gem status.
What’s more, if it helps me realise there’s still so much to discover in a region I thought I’d had my fill of, I’m more than happy to sing its praises.
