If a bank manager had had his way Andrew Borg might be cooking fast food till this day. But the Maltese chef is persistent, contrarian and never gives up even when the going gets tough. His persistence meant that he successfully ran the Black Pig making a name for himself not only locally but also with international visitors to Malta. But it was not just the bank manager that he had to convince but also a local crowd that did not necessarily understand what he was doing. The chef patron of Black Pig Restaurant ended up closing the restaurant in September 2016 when he found a buyer but had a new project lined up. Together with the owners of Casa Ellul, a boutique hotel in Valletta, he set out to open a bistro though the project took longer to materialise than expected. He wanted to be able to work with a team and in the process he has assembled a team that can raise Malta’s bar when it comes to the fine dining scene. A few days before Christmas I received a WhatsApp from a friend … [Read more...]
Interview with Andrew Borg: A vision for Malta’s dining scene
The life of a passionate chef is not always easy, particularly when he or she needs to fight against tradition and a dining scene that is not necessarily ready for a new approach. Tradition and habit may be the hardest things to fight against because few people may understand what you are trying to do. Then there is also the business side of running a restaurant. Do you follow the crowd or do you try to persist in creating something different even if that comes at a huge expense? Andrew Borg, the chef patron of Black Pig Restaurant in Valletta, the capital city of Malta, not only had to fight tradition and habits, but also against a bank manager in order to convince him that he did not want to open a takeaway instead of a fine dining restaurant. That restaurant, unfortunately closed last month. A few days ago, Andrew announced that he had closed his restaurant and that he would be taking a sabbatical before coming back with a new exciting project next year. The intention to … [Read more...]
Black Pig Restaurant (Valletta): Where innovation meets seasonality
Time passes and with it some say also comes nostalgia. While there are certain things which take you on a trip down memory lane, there are some memories which are best forgotten. Go back to the 1980s and early 1990s and my memory of most restaurants in Malta is of them serving the same thing. With friends we remember the ubiquitous tortellini with fresh cream, ham and mushrooms or the shrimp or prawn cocktail from those retro years or a steak diane. Everyone seemed to serve the same things. There were few speciality restaurants which were really worth the detour because they were doing something completely different. Maybe they specialised in fish or were serving French classics. At the time, these restaurants were doing something different to what was the norm. Maybe it was hard at the time to go against the current but with the benefit of time, they managed to not only survive but to be successfully copied. What used to be specialised those days is now mainstream. That … [Read more...]