Malindi hosts week of Italian cuisine

The tourist resort town of Malindi will for the first time host the world week of Italian cuisine beginning Wednesday  to December 1.

Locals and foreigners in Malindi and Watamu will get a chance to sample Italian food.

Malindi and Watamu are renowned Italian tourist destinations, which recorded over 65,000 visitors from the European nation last year.

Ten tourism resorts and Italian restaurants are scheduled to prepare different menus of Italian cuisine during the week-long festival.

The participating restaurants include Leopard Point Luxury Beach Resort, Tangeri Lounge, Bar Bar, Baby Marrow, Malaika Beach resort, La Malindina, Billionaire Beach Resort, Kilili Baharini Resort and Spa, Osteria Beach Restaurant and Olimpia Club.

The restaurants offered free food to residents at Oasis Mall to hundreds of residents who turned up to have a taste.

Freddie Di Curatolo, spokesman of the Italian community in Malindi, said the week-long festival will showcase the rich culture of the Italian cuisine.

Italian ambassador to Kenya Alberto Pieri is expected to grace the festival.

He said the Ambassador will officially launch a selection of the famous book ''Pellegrino Artusi Science in the Kitchen, the Art of eating well '' which was translated into Swahili on November 30 at Kilili Baharini resort.

''This is a good chance for Malindi because for the last 40 years has had the presence of the Italian community, one of our excellence is food culture and we cook a lot of Kenyans from the coast how to cook and how to make nice food,'' he said.

Curatolo said they want to show all people from the world their nice cuisine made by Italians.

He said they prepare pizza, Italian Pasta and also prepare local foods in the Italian way such as fish or meat.

''We have an Italian NGO which every day produces hundreds of chicken and eggs and from that, we are able to make Italian foods from it,'' he said.

During the festival, he said there would be music and Italian speakers who would explain how to prepare the diverse cuisine for people to understand.

He said they expect all the restaurants to be full of both locals from Nairobi and foreigners from Europe as the high season has already picked.

Nancy Palumbo the Manager of Leopard beach resort Malindi said they were happy to present the Italian cuisine all over the world.

''This is important for us as it gives us an opportunity to highlight all our flavors and meet the people, our big idea today is to make people feel the taste of Italian food,'' he said.

She said the event was a big opportunity for Malindi to host it in the resort town to showcase the Italian foods.

Jackson Kanai a local who tasted the food described it as nice and urged even locals not to fear to go to Italian restaurants as their meals were good and affordable.

This is a good opportunity for them to taste Italian Kitchen it's very delicious and I think it's affordable," he said.

Leonardo Dangelo from Malaika Beach Resort said they will be making goat meat which will be done in the Italian style.

"Everyday will be a special menu from Italian restaurants us we will be in Malaika beach restaurant will be a special menu of Italian and African menu," he said.

Masha Kenga a resident of Malindi who tasted Italian cuisine said it was so nice and tasty adding that Kenyans should embrace Italian foods.