Gianluca D’Agostino
The importance and simplicity of tradition

Gianluca D’Agostino was born in Naples in 1977 to Avellino parents. He lived in Naples until he was 6 and returned to Avellino, in Castelvetere, until he was 18. He has a home in Castelvetere and his wife is from there. Favorite dishes: eggplant parmigiana in summer and sausage and friarielli in winter.
Despite an innate passion for cooking and family culture for food full of respect, D’Agostino’s training goes beyond the classic paths: he did not start at 15 years old and did not attend the hotel business, after high school he enrolled in Law school in Naples, at Federico II.
To work in the kitchen is a need: to achieve economic independence. Work started in Avellino’s trattorias, at the age of 24 and he had experience in London.
As a turning point in his training path, D’Agostino remembers an episode that occurred during a Culinary Course in 2003 at Città del Gusto in Rome. Chef-trainer Severino Gaiezza asked D’Agostino to work as a cook in Focene, Fiumicino.
When someone gives you trust, independence and you have the courage to jump, you become aware of your own growth. It was also a useful experience to take further steps.
Steps that after years of training and work lead to Veritas, Stefano Giancotti’s restaurant, which honors ingredients. A project that is structured over time, grows in the number of collaborators in the kitchen and in the dining room, until it reaches, with hard and gradual work and with the support of the owner, the long-awaited recognition, the star.
In the small space of Corso Vittorio Emanuele in Naples, the ambience is organized to give rest from the daily hectic pace and to find a cuisine that evolves by going backwards, towards tradition.
For D’Agostino, the only way to compete with other European cuisines is to look at Italian regional cuisine, where a multitude of quality products are transformed into a million recipes, especially in the South.

Obviously, everything is modernized with the support of technology: less fat, enhancing some flavors and lowering others, to achieve a weekly menu always in line with the balance of the Mediterranean diet.