“Italians know fashion and food,” says Donatella De Vette, a case in point. When she moved to Chicago from Rome in the mid-90s, she was an expert in both. Her first business here was an haute couture outlet store, Donatella Boutique, in Old Town. “My friends at home told me Chicago was the Milano of America–lots of industry, hardworking people, and lots of money,” she says. That all turned out to be true enough, but what she didn’t realize was how informally Chicagoans tend to dress. “America’s more casual than Europe,” she says. “There are people in Italy who would shoot you if you wore jeans to the opera. I was coming from that European culture. People in Chicago don’t spend $500 on a suit. Nobody bought. I sold the boutique within two months.”
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Her menu’s rarities include pasta al proscuitto con burro e salvia–featherlight sheets of handmade spinach pasta wrapped around ham and provolone, delicately drizzled with butter and sage. Her minestrone alla Genovese is chock-full of broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower. “That one I had to call my mom for,” she says. “She had never written it down, so I had to keep asking her questions.” Paper-thin-crust pizza is equally delicate–topped with fresh mozzarella and sausage, four cheeses, or exotic mushrooms.
