How Il Gusto di XINGE Elevates Chinese Dining In Florence

Il Gusto di Xinge is not only a visual and a tasteful experience, but also an eye-opening stride into Chinese art, customs and social institutions.

A memorable trip to Florence certainly wouldn’t constitute a Chinese restaurant on a typical itinerary. But there’s something wildly exceptional about Il Gusto di Xinge. Hailed as one of the sexiest restaurants in la città gigliata, Xinge elevates Chinese cuisines in a city where – prior to its opening – Asian food was viewed as quick stir-fry’s, chunky meats fired up in tumbled unrefinement.

The novel is considered as one of the Four Great Classical Novels in Chinese literature, often coined as the first novel in Chinese history to place the main narrative on women since Cao depicted the life of distinct female roles from his childhood, family friends and maids.

Xinge’s interpretation of Cao’s women are reflected upon dishes like the Shibari Chicken – a traditional bondaged chicken platter from the north of China, and even more, like the Lychee Shrimp Fritters Shrimp with mozzarrella cheese watercress that appear like fruits on a tree branch. Each fritter is flavorful, crispy yet delicately opulent. Through Xinge’s vision, today’s modern woman is multifaceted, nonetheless complicated yet she does it all. Il Gusto di Xinge is not only a visual and a tasteful experience, but also an eye-opening stride into Chinese art, customs and social institutions.

How did the restaurant start?

XL: I come from fashion design. I had a business with my partner, and then the business had failed, so I started a second business which was in restaurants. When I was a fashion student, I already had an idea to incorporate Asian culinary style into Florence’s food scene.

During the pandemic, we opened a small restaurant with six places to sit, and an easy product: Sheng Jian Bao (生煎包.) And then, it became more and more famous, so many people came to us. Then we thought about doing something different, to make a place even bigger. So that’s when this idea of Il Gusto di Xinge started two years ago. From a street food product, until today, we’re in the Michelin guide.

What was the idea behind the menu?

XL: Dream of Red Chambers, it’s already from a really famous Chinese writer. That is part of our culture that I wanted to share with our clients, our friends. What is the idea behind it? What is the thought? What is the tradition? The story of the book is presented through the dishes, Dream of Red Chambers. Most of the time, the clients will say: Oh, that is very interesting, I want to buy this book and understand it better.

That’s it, it’s not only food and fashion. But we also deliver culture.

Tell us about the cocktail pairing menu?

XL: I think, for example, in London or in Paris, they’re more focused on the U.S. cocktail world. For us, Italy is still in the beginning. Even though there are a lot of famous bars. For us, it’s so important to mix this idea together with our culture, as well as the cocktail world. So I had the idea to do menu pairing with cocktails. I think there’s also something Taiwanese in New York, like Double Chicken Please which is so famous. Very impressive, that’s something we need to study.

Explain to us each dish’s glamorous presentation!

XL: It’s more about the sensibility of a woman. In the meantime, we’re so in our world. That is the idea I wanted to bring to the restaurant. So it’s not only about sharing food and eating. It’s about our own experiences, so there’s a thought behind every dish. What do you want to be? What are our memories? What are our emotions?

For example, we have a dish, called: Shibari Chicken. It’s bondage chicken, a traditional dish from the north of China. But then, we decided to make the shibari artwork around the chicken. Because sometimes we feel a lot of pressure, there are a lot of responsibilities around us. There’s an invisible role, so we need to free ourselves. We want to break it, we want to say no to responsibilities, relationships or whatever. So that is the concept.

You have to resolve the problem. So the problem is not the rope, it’s ourselves. If you eat the chicken, you free the soul and you free yourself.

How do you change the way people think about Chinese food?

XL: When I was here in 2005, there were only a few Chinese restaurants. People think about our culture, they think about Chinese fast food. This is the idea I want to change. Our culinary history has so many ideas, or different products, materials. And how we work – the technique. I want to change the idea of how they think about Asian cuisine.

I think it’s more about that I’m a mother, there are so many emotions or stress. I need to adjust, then I change to another side of my life – to my daughter. It’s not easy. Of course, with this kind of job, what we’re doing, it requires a lot of patience and time here. So I spend more time in the restaurant than with my daughter.

What does XINGE mean?

XL: It came from my mother, Xinge means: princess of the heart. In our family, women characters are always very strong. It’s also from my great grandmother, even though her feet were bound, since men didn’t want women to go too fast. She married when she was 28. During that time, this was already very old, but she came from a very rich family, so they didn’t want her to marry very soon. When she married my great grandfather, he already had two kids but he died several years later. She never remarried, and instead, took care of the kids, completely by herself.

For me, a woman’s character is very strong. And then, there’s my mother. Now she’s in Italy with me. For me, yeah, it’s so important.

What is the ultimate Xinge restaurant experience?

XL: The whole experience is something you don’t find in Florence. This place would be in New York or in London. This could be your dream. This is exactly what I wanted to do. So the idea is living in the dream, we are living in our dreams.

Sometimes, we do surprise gold powder in the air. With the light shining and people feeling good. They can leave their stress behind and enjoy their dinner experience.