MENDOZA, ARGENTINA / AGILITYPR.NEWS / June 09, 2020 / Francis Mallmann is a man who needs little introduction. Regarded as the godfather of open-fire cooking to his dedicated following of fire cooking culinary explorers, his style of cooking has created a global phenomenon. Without a doubt, Mallmann is South America’s most famous chef and he also has been featured on numerous international television programmes, as well as on the Netflix original series of "Chef’s Table" focusing on his life and cooking techniques.

After a career in gastronomy built on fine-dining French cuisine, Mallmann went back to his roots in the mid-nineties, learning local techniques from his childhood home of Patagonia and bringing them to the high-end food scene. Francis Mallmann is a man whose approach to cooking and living feels like a homage to a forgotten time and place. While many influential chefs around the world have engaged in an escalating competition to be as creative and forward-thinking in gastronomy as possible, Mallmann has swerved in the opposite direction, forsaking haute-cuisine. Mallmann instead is focusing on a primal style of hospitality whose core comes down to one-syllable words: smoke, fire, air, stone, salt, rain, meat, wine.

Even before the Chef’s Table debut on Netflix, Mallmann’s influence had been growing almost in direct proportion to his desire to distance himself from the culinary upper crust and do his own thing. Mallmann usually spends much of his time in Patagonia, while running his 10 restaurants around the world in South America and also in the USA and France.

A few times a year, Francis Mallmann opens his treasured Patagonian island home to host guests for a magical stay at “La Isla”. This is an unforgettable culinary journey with the ultimate Fire-Cooking masterclass. A journey led by Latin America’s top chef, in one of the most remote corners of Patagonia will guarantee to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

La Isla is a tiny snowy island that you could walk around in less than an hour and it is where Mallmann filmed his Netflix episode of Chef’s Table. The island is remote, lending to the idea to come here mainly to disconnect from today’s busy lives and have magical dining experiences of open-fire cooking.

For the past three months, Mallmann has been in Mendoza, Argentina and stated that “one has the feeling that we are fine here and the virus is controlled, and I think that we are going to be able to open slowly, but you have to think that there are a number of high-end restaurants and hotels that depend on tourism. 90% of our clientele are from tourism, just opening is not going to help us much because our clients are international ”.

There is a sense of appreciation for the stillness in life from Mallmann, and it seems that we all now have an opportunity to rekindle the dreams that we once had, Mallmann says that "we don't grow on a secure path, and all of us should conquer something in life, and it needs a lot of work, and it needs a lot of risk".

One thing is certain, we could all use some of Mallmanns' philosophy in times like these so we can adopt an approach to life that can enrich our appreciation of beauty and love, and that both still exist in the world.

On Friday 12th of June 2020, Francis Mallmann will be speaking live from Mendoza about his experience over the past three months, his approach to change, challenge, fear and freedom.

The virtual event is sponsored by Zoom and organised by Satopia Travel. It will take place on Friday 12th of June 2020 at 4pm BST / 12:00 PM Argentinian time

You can register for the free online event here

This event is part of the Dare to Dream series of virtual experiences organised by Satopia Travel. Join Massimo Bottura, Carlo Cracco, Marco Pierre White, Raymond Blanc and Francis Mallmann as they discuss the future of gastronomy in these free and open to the public virtual events.