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ANTONIO LORENZON
"As I write these lines I am still trembling and incredulous: I have just been proclaimed winner of the ninth edition of MasterChef Italia. All around me has already broken out and inside me there are thoughts and memories that overwhelm me. It is a wave of flavors. , smells and sensations that bring me back to my past, to that child who, upon returning from kindergarten, lit up at the sight of the thirty perfect tortellini he found on his plate. "
IL MIO PERCORSO A MASTERCHEF E LA VITTORIA
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IL MIO MANGO
00:43
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IL MIO PRIMO PESCE
00:37
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IO E LO CHEF BRUNO BARBIERI
00:56
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HO VINTO!
00:59
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LA MIA VITTORIA E LA PROMESSA DI MATRIMONIO
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COMMENTI A CALDO...
"Yes, thirty tortellini, not one less, not one more, in a dish with ragù sauce prepared by the expert and rough hands of my grandmother, which smelled of onion and bleach. I close my eyes and see her face, the his smile, his happiness in seeing me eat with gusto. Thirty tortellini gave me security, that security that I have always found within the walls of my house, in the arms of my grandmother, under the protective gaze of my father and the love of my mother.
I clung to thirty tortellini and the love of my family even when, as a child, I felt that outside the protective walls of my home there was something I didn't understand, that made me feel wrong, different. "
"And the stoves were my shelter, my consolation when my grandmother left me and I had to prepare lunch by myself while waiting for my tired mother to return from work. The kitchen was the place where I took refuge when around for me everything was complicated. Even reading a simple page at school was a titanic undertaking for me. I did not understand why everyone was able to learn the rudiments of reading and writing while it was so difficult for me: it was the eighties and a dyslexic child he was considered poorly capable. I did not understand why everyone else was able to bond and I was the overweight child who was never considered. "
"I felt incapable and stupid. But at home I breathed the passion for food and there I learned to knead, roll the dough, bake, sauté. At the eighth grade exam a professor understood my strength, he made me bring one of my recipe and, in front of the commission, I presented myself with a fruit tart.
It makes me tenderness to think back to that little boy who felt so different. But different from whom? I think today… Because the only truth is that each of us is beautiful in his uniqueness: it is imperfections and singularities that make us human. Diversity, on the other hand, is nothing more than a statistical concept that mathematicians use to define values that deviate from a set or an average, and it has nothing to do with people. Diversity is in everything, it is intrinsic in every gesture we make and in every person we meet. And we must be ready to accept it because it is only by confronting it that we can evolve and improve. "
"At a certain point I realized that diversity is the true strength of us human beings. And I began to look out into that world so colorful, with so many nuances, which allowed me to bring out, with great effort, with so many blows and disappointments the best part of me: from the clerk in the clothing stores to the window dresser, up to taking on important positions as art director and stylist. It was not easy for a teenager to make his way in a world where homosexuality was considered a pathology, a perversion, a frivolity made, in the common imagination, of stiletto heels and ostrich boas. "
"You were forced to hide, to pretend, to feel that you are never yourself. Until Daniel came into my life, and from that moment we took hands and started building our family head on. It was not easy for my parents to embrace the idea of my homosexuality. But when they perceived that ours was a happy and ordinary life, like that of any couple in love living together, making plans, that I had not started wearing stilettos and that I was always the same person, they changed their minds and everything became easier. "
"Antonio, do you remember this dish? Did you see what dish it is?". Daniel, in the semifinal, unbeknownst to him, complicates things for me by offering me paella and brings it to that plate, that dish of the ceramic service that my father gave us on his last Christmas. He had sent the package to the oncology ward, hidden under his bed, his Christmas present for us. A service of dishes. We still did not know that soon he would leave us, but with that gift he wanted to close the circle, he had shown us the way. And now I find myself here looking at those dishes, leaning against the counter in our kitchen, and I understand many things. "
"I understand how much my father, without ever using a word, understood, accepted and loved me. How much he felt my pain when I received insults, when I suffered injustices, when, inexplicably, I became the target of someone who, in order to buy some an inch more to give to his littleness, he tried in vain to bend me and take away my dignity. It was my father who taught me that all the hatred and anger that is thrown on you can be used as a special fertilizer to make you grow luxuriantly those seeds that you have planted with so much effort. And those seeds nourish you, nourish those around you, and strengthen you so much that you are able to courageously leave behind you the disappointments of the past, the resentments, the remorse, the regrets, with a straight gaze, open to the future. And with this thought my gaze moves up to the balcony, looking for it. "
"I don't even remember that in the meantime he has come down to celebrate with me. I look for him in the cheering crowd and finally my eyes rest on him. the very long finale. There are no more doubts. There are no more tears. No more fears, no more shyness. After having completed all this journey arm in arm with my father, with my past, with my family, this happiness of mine tonight, I want to share this enormous emotion with him: my present and my future. Silence has returned to the studio, the cameras are far away. "Excuse me, I'd like to say something ..."
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