Top Chef

Fabrizio Moroldo, chef and owner at Moroldo’s Fine Italian Restaurant in Bigfork, is more than capable of cooking in styles from around the world. 

But he knows that his best work is going to be found in his Italian roots.

“Food is a part of the culture you grow up with,” he said. “I like to cook Chinese, but it is not part of my culture.”

Since he opened his restaurant just off of Montana 35 nine years ago, Moroldo has gained a loyal following and rave reviews both from tourists on the Internet and by word-of-mouth from locals. He stays true to the food of his native country, which mixes flavors of different regions in Italy, but adheres to classic styles.

He doesn’t care for new types of experimental cooking. He said when he sits down to dinner, he doesn’t want a tiny amount of food that has been injected with foam, but something more like a “nice plate of pasta.”

That said, he is not afraid to try pairings of flavors that might surprise customers — one of his pastas features grapes for a modern mix of sweet and savory — but he is careful not to be too adventurous.

“You can put Ferrari tires on a Ford, but it won’t be as fast as a Ferrari,” he said. “You have to put the right ingredients together.”

Moroldo’s food also has gained him the acclaim of fellow chefs. He was included in the recently released inaugural edition of “Best Chefs America,” a guide for which fewer than 500 chefs from throughout the country are highlighted. The listings are based on recommendations made through interviews with more than 5,000 of the best chefs in the United States.

Moroldo and Andy Blanton of Cafe Kandahar in Whitefish were the only chefs named from the Flathead Valley.

Moroldo, 53, said the recognition from his peers is a significant honor.  

“Another chef can really tell if you’re a good cook or not,” Moroldo said. “It’s not a conflict of friendship or someone who says you’re a good cook because you’re a nice guy.”

Moroldo and his wife, Laura, built the restaurant nine years ago after vacationing in Bigfork. They loved the environment, with its landscape similar to the mountainous region of his native home in northern Italy, plus there were no Italian restaurants in the area at the time. 

Immigrating wasn’t easy, but the Moroldos were able to gain E-2 investor visas available to new startups. 

Family members still don’t have green cards, so they have to leave the country every two years to have their visas renewed, and then every five years they have to go back to Italy. Moroldo said it’s possible that based on arbitrary reasons the U.S. immigration service might not renew their status at some point, despite Moroldo’s contributions to the community as a reliable employer. 

He hires 10 people in the busy summer months, when the restaurant is open six days a week, and five during most of the rest of the year. 

His family is a great help, with his 13-year-old twins, Ethan and Kimberly, often lending a hand in the restaurant and Laura, who grew up in South Africa, working in the dining room and making some of the desserts. (When he can get away from the restaurant, Moroldo enjoys playing tennis and soccer.)

Moroldo said too many people are entranced by the chefs they see on television and think that they can emulate them with some schooling and a certificate. Becoming a true restaurant chef, Moroldo said, is more a matter of experience, which trumps anything a person can learn in a classroom or by cooking for family and friends at home.

“To cook for 10 is something,” Moroldo said. “To cook for 50 is another.”

Morolodo started cooking at age 12 in the family kitchen with his grandmother and decided to pursue food as a career by age 14, when he began culinary school training. At age 16, his family moved to France, so he continued his culinary education there. 

One of his first jobs was at the luxurious Savoy Hotel in London. There he learned how to cook both well and efficiently, as there would be times when there were 1,000 diners in the banquet hall. 

“What you learn there is technique,” he said of his Savoy position. “You learn to be fast but to keep up your presentation. It was good for my future. I know how to organize a kitchen.”

From there he moved back to Italy, where he was a chef in the five-star Grand Hotel in Rimini on the Adriatic Coast. He also worked in Turin, Milan and Vincenza, Italy, and at the Hotel Splendid in Lugano, Switzerland.

He had a second career in exporting, in bicycle parts and security systems, for 15 years, and also has worked as a restaurant consultant. He has visited 98 countries, much of that due to the exporting business that had him on a plane constantly.

He was not working as a chef when he and Laura decided to start the restaurant in Bigfork, but he wanted to get back to that life and spend more time with his twins than the exporting business allowed.

They had the restaurant newly constructed, with much of what is in the restaurant imported from Italy, including the furniture and kitchen equipment.

Finding good staff was one of the most difficult things about starting a restaurant from the ground up in a smaller town, he said, since he wanted to establish a good reputation early. 

But with the employee issues more or less ironed out, he has developed a base of regular local customers and many from throughout the state who will travel just to eat at Moroldo’s. He also captures his share of Bigfork’s busy tourist traffic in the summer, though he wouldn’t mind if the off-season months were busier.  

Everything served at Moroldo’s, with the exception of the Bolognese sauce, the lasagna and the tiramisu, is made when ordered, he said. Even the pasta is cooked per serving, though he said many other restaurants will precook it in the morning and heat it up later. 

Customers should view their meal at Moroldo’s as a leisurely experience, in the European style of a full night of eating and conversation, Moroldo said. His restaurant has chairs for around 56 customers indoors — 80 when the patio is open — but he doesn’t expect to have multiple seatings in a night. 

“A lot of people will sit here all night,” he said. “People should enjoy and we never push customers so we can have the table. Eating is not just to fill the belly. It’s part of a culture to enjoy what you eat.”

Reporter Heidi Gaiser may be reached at 758-4439 or by email at hgaiser@dailyinterlake.com.