Parco Fiera’s cuisine is about complex, intensely creative dishes in which fermentation magic ensures maximum enjoyment of cured meats. Homemade salumi is the star in a degustation course of twelve to fifteen dishes that harness the power of fermentation. In addition to the wide range of salumi, almost every seasoning is homemade – even salt and vinegar. And Nakajo feels great responsibility partaking in another creature’s life, so he is sure to use every part of the animal without waste.

Contrast dishes like the gnocco fritto fried bread from the Emilia region that share Italian traditions with ingenious combinations not found anywhere, like prosciutto with soft cod roe, a nigiri sushi style bite of Hokkaido Yumepirika rice topped with prosciutto cotto, or friend anago conger that has been marinated in sweet wine and spices then topped with coppa. Chef Nakajo tastes his salumi to assess flavor and texture to determine the best mode and preparation for service.

In a complex crab salad, all but three of the ingredients – crab, green onions, and olive oil – are homemade. Nakajo begins with Okhotsk Sea crab and boils it in homemade sea salt. It has green onions and sea urchin dressed in salt and olive oil, a canola flower sauce containing plum vinegar, and it is topped with setoka marmalade, fermented mustard, and a dash of fennel oil to finish. The array of fermented seasonings packed into one dish accentuates the ingredients’ innate flavors while also readying the belly and palate for the best flavor experience of the cured meats to follow. There is also a dish of oysters in fermented turnip soup, mortadella, and dishes containing Ezo deer sausage.

There is one key ingredient in every dish – LOVE. Love for producers and the ingredients, and a love that inspires Nakajo’s work to please guests, including making small bites for elderly guests and easy-to-cut pieces, all in the name of stress-free dining. He is constantly monitoring the number of times a guest chews and calculating their body temperature and speed of metabolism based on whether they are sweating, and he makes minor adjustments to suit them. For example, the thickness of prosciutto that melts in the mouth of one guest may need to be chewed by another. And because the condition of the human gut differs based on hormones and the volume of different enzymes depending on origin, be it Asia or Europe, Nakajo endeavors to serve fermented foods that may be more familiar to each guest. It is a lot to monitor, which is why he limits each sitting to six guests and has to do every part of the process alone.

INGREDIENTS
Parco Fiera ingredients come predominantly from Hokkaido, especially from people he is in direct contact with: seafood from the local market, meats delivered by producers, and vegetables direct from the farmers who grow them. He uses organic vegetables and herbs cultivated by his father at their family home. Many other vegetables are so local that the chef collects them himself, also venturing into the mountains to forage for sansai mountain vegetables and mushrooms. He even accompanies hunters on deer hunts. The flour is also Hokkaido-grown, and the Yumepirika brand-name rice comes from the farm of one of his high school bandmates. Apart from olive oil, Nakajo needs not purchase seasonings because he makes them all himself.

The meats used in his salumi include local Ezo deer and pigs raised on whey supplied direct by a Hokkaido cheesemaker. The result is succulent flesh that melts in the mouth with a sweetness like butter. Many restaurants serving prosciutto use manual slicers to achieve the typically thin, fluffy texture. But Nakajo uses an electric slicing machine as it allows him to make the minute adjustments necessary for his wide range of salumi. His is a Berkel – an Italian brand considered the Ferrari of slicers.

The excellent wine selection is a showcase of natural wines from Italy, France, Slovenia, and other countries. They are the perfect match for cuisine that likewise contains no additives. There are also choices of sake and wine by Hokkaido makers dear to Nakajo.