San Diego’s Accursio Lota Has Won Italy’s Highest Chef Award

And so, turns out, there’s more to the snail story.

A few years back, Accursio Lota—2017 World Pasta Champion and chef-owner of Cori Pastificio and the new Dora Ristorante which was named for his nonna—told us he raised snails under his family’s staircase as a child in Sicily. Fattened them up on raw spaghetti and fresh herbs, eventually ending their journey on this planet with some butter and garlic.

Turns out this was an entire neighborhood kid thing. Some kids ride bikes. Some puree their brains playing video games. Kids in Lota’s neighborhood waited for the rain to come, then went around collecting a very Sicilian version of escargot.

“There would be all of us kids out there with our grocery bags,” he tells us on this week’s episode of Happy Half Hour. “We’d all have bags full of snails.”

Lota was just awarded the Tre Forchette from Gambero Rosso (essentially the Michelin Guide of Italy). It’s the very highest honor you can get as an Italian chef, equivalent to three Michelin stars. Lota’s the only San Diego chef to receive the honor, and one of only 11 chefs outside of Italy.

He brings some focaccia into SDM. We eat, we laugh, we talk about snails, the history of Italian food and why we should give a damn, and name some of our favorite Italian dishes and spots in the city.