A restaurant in the Italian town of Castelfranco Veneto has come up with an ingenious way to get a leg up on the competition – treating guests to a unique dish called “fried air”.
Nicola Dinato, the head chef at Feva Restaurant wanted to capture the essence of being outdoors and breathing fresh air in an dish aptly called “aria fritta” or “fried air”.
The name is a tad misleading, as the crispy treats are actually made of tapioca skin that’s first baked and then deep fried.
However, there’s some air involved in the cooking process as well, or at least a component of it – ozone.
After the tapioca skin is baked and fried, it is infused with ozone for 10 minutes, which gives the treats a special perfume.
After the special infusion, the crispy fried air is placed on a bed of cotton candy, which Dinato hopes will remind patrons of clouds.
Fried air has been making headlines online for over a month now, mostly because Feva Restaurant allegedly charges $30 per serving.
However, according to an employee of the restaurant who commented on an article about the dish, wrote that fried air is actually offered for free to all guests, as a welcome. He also called it a “provocation to frivolity”.
“I always serve it as an appetizer to remind my clients that they always have to try and fill their life with real experiences,” chef Dinato told Tribuna di Treviso.