San Domenico Palace, Taormina, A Four Seasons Hotel

Four Seasons Tenure

• Since 2021
• First Four Seasons Assignment: Current

Employment History

• Mirazur Restaurant, Menton, France; Rossellini’s at Palazzo Avino, Ravello, Italy; Del Cambio, Torino, Italy; Le Chalet D’Adrien in Verbier, Switzerland

Education

• I.P.S.S.A.R. Raffaele Viviani di Castellammare di Stabia (Naples - Italy)

Birthplace

• Gragnano, Naples - Italy

Languages Spoken

• Italian, French, Spanish, English

Born in 1990 in Gragnano, in the province of Naples, Vincenzo Abagnale defies definition as a pastry chef. He is neither traditional nor regional; he embraces an international vision, bringing lightness and elegance to each of his creations.

After an initial experience in his homeland, Vincenzo moved to Switzerland, where he began his career as pastry chef at La table d’Adrien, the Michelin-star restaurant of Le Chalet d’Adrien.

Here Vincenzo honed in on his great passion for pastry learning every technique, with extreme accuracy and opening his mind to an international interpretation of the world of patisserie.

After his experience in Switzerland, Vincenzo returned to Italy where he worked at Rossellini’s Restaurant on the Amalfi Coast. Here he was “discovered” and invited to join the brigade of the famous Mirazur restaurant in France, where he spent four wonderful years. As a part of the Mirazur team, Vincenzo celebrated many successes that included earning three Michelin stars and being voted number one on the famed World’s 50 Best Restaurants list in 2019.

In 2021, with the arrival of the Four Seasons brand in Sicily, Vincenzo was inspired to return to Italy and start his new adventure at San Domenico Palace. There are similarities between the Sicilian and his own culture and Vincenzo felt right at home.

In Sicily, he has discovered a great sense of belonging, and a quasi-religious respect for local ingredients and rich seasonality. Admiring all these elements, Vincenzo wants to pursue a personal challenge and go against the tide by capturing the essence of Sicily not in a traditional but in an innovative way. Vincenzo creates light and fresh desserts that are conceived to be discovered little by little. At the first bite, one cannot quite decipher what the dessert is, yet then everything is revealed with each morsel. In his creations, a breaking element is always used as a key to interpret the dessert, surprising the senses. Everything is harmonious but there is always one element that disrupts the roundness of taste and gives it that memorable and unmistakable quality that is his signature. Among the most acclaimed desserts: “Bronte – Tokyo,” which was born from the encounter between local ingredients such as pistachio and lemon, and oriental products that represent the disruptive elements, in this case soy sauce and yellow miso. Another one is “di fiore in fiore,” in which the sweetness from honey, acidity of yuzu and freshness of mint take to whoever tastes this dessert another dimension.

It is Vincenzo’s hope to make an indelible mark on every guest of San Domenico Palace’s heart (and palate) with his contemporary and innovative desserts.