No. 38 · Primavera 2026

Il & Giornale The Journal of Demartino · Dispatches from the Kitchen

Six-minute read · Field notes
Il Giornale / From Parma / The Thirty-Sixth Month
Field notes · From Parma · Issue 38

The thirty-

sixth · month.

A Saturday at Slega, the family that has cured prosciutto for our kitchen since Pietro walked in with his father's letter of introduction in 1994. On waiting, and what waiting earns you.

By Elena DemartinoHead chef · Fitzrovia
Photos Luca MorettiParma, 14 March 2026
Filed 20 March 2026From the dining room
Reading Six minutes1,840 words · 4 photos
Two thousand legs, every one of them waiting. The east wall of Slega's third cellar, photographed in the hour before the morning's first turn. Slega · Langhirano · 2026
Two thousand legs, every one of them waiting. The east wall of Slega's third cellar, photographed in the hour before the morning's first turn. Photograph · Luca Moretti
Author photo
The writer
Elena Demartino

Fourth-generation. Elena leads the kitchen at Demartino, Fitzrovia. She cooked at Reale in Abruzzo and at Relae in Copenhagen before returning to London in 2014. She writes roughly once a month, from wherever she happens to be standing.

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