After almost 30 years fixing boilers, Fulvio Borriello will soon open a focacceria on Great Chapel Street in Soho. “If you had told me then that one day there would be a bakery in Soho with my name above the door, I would have asked you what you had been drinking,” he tells Broadsheet.
Opening on November 16, Fulvio’s is a new spot from the team behind pizzeria Fatto a Mano where focaccia will be baked throughout the day, then cut and filled to order with ingredients such as mortadella, artichoke cream and parmesan, or parma ham, mozzarella and sun-blushed tomatoes.
The project began with staff lunch at the original Fatto a Mano in Brighton. After losing his job as a gas engineer, Borriello moved from Italy to the seaside city, where his son Luca was working as a pizzaiolo at the restaurant and his daughter Chiara was working front of house. He started as a delivery driver before taking on kitchen shifts and cooking for the team.
“One day I used some of the dough to make a focaccia, and from there I began to experiment and refine it, trying all kinds of flavours,” he says. “Judging by the empty trays, the team approved.”
Eventually, the restaurant’s co-founder Rupert Davidson suggested giving the bread a home of its own. At first, Borriello assumed he was joking. “He said my focaccia deserved its own place, and I thought it was his way of asking for another tray.”
The recipe has evolved quite a lot since those early lunches, with much of trial and error. “In a kitchen full of Italians, everyone has an opinion about bread, so I always had a very honest jury,” he says.
Nevertheless, “the ingredients have never changed,” Borriello continues, “flour, water, salt, yeast. And lots of extra virgin olive oil.” Now, though, it uses a biga pre-ferment and a slow prove of at least 24 hours to achieve what he describes as an airy interior and crisp, golden crust.
The opening menu will feature eight to 10 filled focaccia, alongside a rotating list of specials and the option to build your own. There’ll be a vegan version with grilled peppers, marinated courgettes, rocket and Sicilian pesto, while Borriello’s own favourite is the Caprese, made with tomatoes, mozzarella and pesto, which reminds him of the bread, olive oil and tomato he ate growing up in Torre del Greco, near Naples. The mortadella filling, meanwhile, is inspired by the hot focaccia he remembers buying at neighbourhood bakeries before school.
“For me, the filling must never shout louder than the bread,” Borriello says. “If you can’t taste the focaccia, I have made a mistake.”
Each morning, Borriello and his team will serve pastries and filled croissants, followed by focaccia from 11am. There’ll also be a fridge shelf devoted to tiramisu, and coffee made with a dark-roasted Italian blend from London roaster Kofee.
There is one caveat, though: order a cappuccino after midday and a Bell of Shame will announce your crime to the room. “We will make it for you,” Borriello says. “But the bell will ring, everybody will look, and you will know. It’s not a punishment, it’s education. With love.”
Fulvio’s Focacceria opens November 16 at 3 Great Chapel Street,W1F 8FL. On opening day, the first 100 filled focaccia will be free from 11am, with 50 per cent off all food and drinks throughout the day.
Fulvio's Focacceria will be open Mon to Fri 8am–5pm and Sat & Sun 9am–5pm.
