Italian chefs are under pressure to ban garlic from their restaurants thanks to former Italian Prime Minister and media mogul Silvio Berlusconi.

The campaign began yesterday on Italian TV station Canale 5, one of the three networks owned by renowned garlic-hater Berlusconi, with an impassioned plea for Italian restaurants not to use “stinking garlic” in their dishes.

Berlusconi’s aversion to one of Italian cooking’s most renowned ingredients is such that he had it banned when Italy hosted the G8 summit in 2001.

But the backlash has already begun with Aldo Zilli telling London’s Metro newspaper: “'Italy has gone absolutely mad. Garlic is the most important ingredient in cooking – it simply cannot happen.”

Read full article in the Times here >> 

London chefs switch off their lights >> 

Aldo Zilli teams up with Thomsonfly >> 

By Christopher Walton

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