Niko Romito

Reale

Niko Romito is a self-taught Chef, deeply rooted in Abruzzo, the region in which he was born. When Niko entered a kitchen for the first time, he never thought it would become his world. He was studying Economics at university in Rome, with still a few exams to take to complete it, dreaming of a career as a Finance Advisor, when his father, who had recently transformed the family-run pastry shop Reale into a trattoria, fell ill.

From Economics to Monastery

Cristiana and Niko came back to Abruzzo to take care of the trattoria. They intended to keep it going until they would find a buyer. Instead, the two siblings became passionate about the job and when their father passed away, decided to take over the Reale.

In 2011, the restaurant moved to Casadonna, a 16th-century former Monastery in Castel di Sangro that Cristiana and Niko renovated and furnished by choosing materials and works of art aligned with their idea of elegance, purity, and beauty and consistent with the culinary philosophy of Reale Restaurant.

The purity of Abruzzo

Today, through in-depth study, research, and relentless experimentation, combined with a strong entrepreneurial drive, Niko Romito has succeeded in consolidating an innovative culinary style, infused with his own identity together with a complex system that combines haute-cuisine, various formats, top-level training, and products for home consumption. His cooking philosophy is based on purity, verticality, vegetables, and lightness and rooted in expressing the Abruzzo land.

“Purity is the supreme synthesis of flavour, it is essentiality and then beauty. Searching for purity means making the synthesis of something extremely complex but in a clear way and catching the quintessence. Synthesis is the hardest thing to achieve, but it is the form of beauty I am searching for.”

Niko Romito

Instagram: @nikoromito @ristorantereale
Restaurant: https://www.nikoromito.com/
Restaurant address: Piana Santa Liberata – 67031, Castel di Sangro AQ, Italy