New Sardinian Cuisine on the Fly

JUNE 10th, 2021. A little over a year ago, we wanted to start a small hotel in Cuglieri, but then, as everyone knows, something happened and our perspective changed. It did not feel good to have to rely on many visitors from abroad coming for shorter stays. We started thinking about doing something more local. Something that could benefit the people who live here the year round. We started a food truck.

That is how the idea of ​​a food truck was born. Food trucks began in the United States and spread from there. Here in Sardinia, there are few, and in western Sardinia there are almost none. We did not want to make cheap fast food, but really good food with Sardinian roots. With locally produced ingredients and real cooking. Yet, simple dishes that can be eaten on the go without a plate.

My husband Jonathan, who has a history as a chef and ran a restaurant himself a long time ago, started discussing with Leonardo Marongiu, a chef who returned to Sardinia after years of chefing in continental Italy and further afield, who embraced the idea wholeheartedly. Two basic ideas developed. Making fritto misto, deep-fried fish, seafood, and vegetables. Everyone loves freshly deep-fried food, but it is hard and a little tricky to make at home. And Leonardo added sauces, which are not common here. The other idea was to roast large pieces of meat slowly over a real fire with the help of a kamado grill.

This type of grill has been used by the Chinese and Japanese for over 3000 years. In the 70s the modern ceramic grill started to evolve out of the Japanese Mushikamado. It is so versatile that it can be used for grilling, smoking, baking, searing, barbecuing, or roasting. We use a Monolith kamado grill for cooking slowly and ecologically efficient, with the least energy consumption and carbon emissions. https://www.monolithkamadogrill.it/

We thought and planned somewhat in the abstract when we learned that a food truck, or rather a food trailer was for sale and at a good price. We took the leap and became owners of a restaurant on wheels in February 2021. It was high time to talk about design, names, and all that.

To the first meeting, everyone came with their favourite name, but nothing really appealed to everybody, until Leonardo came up with the idea that we could name the truck after Strada Statale 292, the road that connects Cuglieri with Oristano and Alghero. The name also influenced the design of the truck. We focused on western Sardinia visually. The raw materials, the sea, the sun, the strong colours and the 292 road itself.

I found a designer, Aurora Cacciapuoti, who is from Sardinia. This was indispensable as we wanted pictures of many of the traditional and local ingredients. She drew the logo and the originals, and I pulled them together into a design. A local printing company printed the plastic film that was put on the trailer. All this went remarkably smoothly.

Then came something that was a bit less than smooth. The bureaucracy. A huge number of permits are needed to start a food truck in Italy. We ended up with a thick binder of different documents, just as many as to start a complete restaurant. In addition, one must have a permit for every single place where the truck is to be parked.

Then there were a thousand different practical details. Things in the kitchen that had to be replaced, etc. Electricity, waste management, staff and so on.

Nevertheless, the food truck 292 opened on May 15, three months after we bought it. We began at the beach in Santa Caterina, Cuglieri's nearest beach. And it was an immediate success, something that many in Cuglieri had longed for even though they did not know it. Everyone loved the food.

But of course, many things were not in place when we opened, or even now, three weeks later. The food is evolving. As yet, the truck is only open in the evenings, except on Sundays. But in the next weeks, we bring the number of employed up to eight, three cook on the truck, two in the preparatory kitchen, and three take care of the drinks and the cash register, two of whom are part-time. For several, this is the first time they have had a tax-paying job as western Sardinia is a poor area and many work off the grid.

Our website (www.duenovedue.it) is still not in place. We are not sure about our slogan but are talking about "Real Food on the Fly".

Personally, I am doing something right now that I never ever thought would be for me. I got an idea for a dessert for the truck and started experimenting with ice cream sandwiches, made from ice cream from Cuglieri’s own ice cream maker, Cioccolateria Masala, and Swedish cookies. Right now, I believe most in three different types of cookies: a chocolate one, an almond one (which is also gluten-free) and a cookie derived from Sweden’s favourite snack, a cinnamon bun. These are to be combined with chocolate ice cream, lemon ice cream or maybe orange ice cream. Or maybe we will only use classic Sardinian or Italian flavours. We will see. My next weekend will be devoted to this project. This also involves thinking in terms of volume production, raw material prices, packaging, and easy consumption. In any case, I’m having fun and the family has the chance to try them out.

We have had a particular problem. Coins for change as the dishes are quite inexpensive. But it takes forever to go to the bank here, because not much banking business is done on-line . Then we realised that the best source of coins in the village must of course be the local priest. So now we have an abundance of coins that come straight from Cuglieri's church collection. Also, the churches coins come all neatly sorted in plastic rolls, because the priest has a coin counting machine. It feels right, proprio, that the church in Cuglieri also in a way participates in our food truck.

Lena Clyne