Former F1 champ and long-time Monaco resident Nico Rosberg took a rather embarrassing fall from his parked electric Energica motorbike whilst filming for his YouTube channel, but the good-natured driver took it all in his stride, turning it from awkward to adorable in two seconds flat.
As head chef of Coya, Victoria Vallenilla has made history in Monaco. But it is not just her gender that is breaking new ground, it is her revolutionary approach to running a kitchen team.
When news broke on Instagram of Coya’s reopening in Monaco, the phone started to ring off the hook within 10 minutes.
“Funnily enough, our base in London made a mistake and sent out the wrong opening date with that post,” General Manager Eric Gorjux laughs as we sit at one of the colourful dining tables overlooking the Mediterranean. “Monaco is so small and Coya is so popular, all you need is one message on Instagram.”
Coya’s annual reopening normally marks the start of “the season” in Monaco, coinciding with the first of a long line of prestigious events – like the Monte-Carlo Rolex Tennis Masters – and signals the return of fine weather and fun times.
But with no audience to speak of at this year’s tennis tournament due to Covid, Coya’s highly anticipated reopening was timed instead for the watered-down Historic Grand Prix of Monaco in late April.
Since then, the restaurant has uniquely offered lunch service to make up for a shortened dinner service (due to curfew) and reservations just keep rolling in.
“We turned down 230 people last Saturday,” says the general manager.
Situated on the coast in the Sporting Monte-Carlo, Coya embraces the deep blues of the Mediterranean Sea and is bravely bold with the colours of Latin America.
Authenticity is most evident in the kitchen, where an army of chefs work around a roaring red-hot pit of coals, delivering the deliciously smoky flavours of Peruvian barbecue. At the helm is Venezuelan-born Victoria Vallenilla.
“Coya is not a fully Peruvian restaurant, it is what we call Nikkei fusion,” the passionate chef tells Monaco Life. “Peru is made up of many cultures, so we focus on Nikkei cuisine and a bit of South America, because those are the flavours that you find in every country there.”
Nikkei food, I came to learn, is Peruvian ingredients — tropical fish, quinoa, aji amarillo peppers — molded by Japanese techniques. Ceviche is particularly indicative of the Nikkei style and here it is made with fresh striped seabass seeped in onion, chilli, lime, sweet potato, and rounded out with coconut milk.
As Peruvian cuisine carries characters of Asia, a spicy beef fillet with crispy shallots and star anise also makes it on to the menu, as does salmon with sesame, wasabi and kaffir lime.
This cross-cultural mingling is present on many plates: burrata with roasted pineapple, kale salad smothered in manchego cheese, patatas bravas, and Mediterranean octopus all mimicking the influences of Europe.
Meanwhile, the South American classics are elevated to meet the expectations of Monegasque diners: chargrilled shitake tacos, Chilean seabass with rice and lime, Wagyu rib eye with adobo and chimichurri.
Like most South Americans, Victoria says she is obsessed with fast food – well, their version of it, anyway. Therefore, spicy popcorn chicken also makes it to our table. It pairs perfectly with my Coya-emblazened Pisco Sour.
“My dream is to one day open a burger restaurant,” laughs the charismatic chef.
It is a surprising statement from a young chef who has trained under Monaco’s starred masters, including Joël Garault and Benoit Witz, then at Alain Ducasse’s Trattoria.
But Victoria says she fell in the love with the Coya concept, the opportunity to cook the dishes that she grew up with, and the team spirit of everyone at the restaurant.
“There is not the same unhealthy pressure that you have in a starred kitchen, where everyone wants to do better than someone else, to take their place. That’s what I realised when I left the Michelin star kitchens,” reveals Victoria.
Yet it is also at Coya, second to Chef Fabrizio Fossati, where the 28-year-old says she was compelled to grow as a leader.
“When you rise up through the ranks, you can either scream and be crazy like the others to scare your chefs into doing what you want, or you can think smart,” says Victoria. “Coya taught me to change the way I get results from people. I figure I have two hands, and I have 400 covers a night, so I cannot do it alone.
“The most important thing is to make them understand what I am looking for, and to treat them how I would like to be treated; I let them know when things are not right, but I also praise and reward them when they do good. This is not a Michelin star restaurant, people don’t work here to look for glory, it is a lot of work. So, I need to keep people motivated.”
It is an innovative approach that this year helped to elevate Victoria Vallenilla to head chef, with Fabrizio Fossati moving on to executive chef of the global Coya brand. She is now the first female head chef of an SBM establishment and all Coya restaurants. But it is not what Victoria necessarily considers an “achievement”.
“People ask me what it feels like to be the first female head chef of SBM, and I say, ‘It is not normal that I am the first one’,” she says confidently. “In the past, it was difficult for me being a girl because a lot of men don’t like being told what to do by a woman, especially if she is younger than them. But I am not a woman in here, I am a chef.”
Victoria now heads a 35-strong team in the kitchen, and the pastry section is 60% female. “Not because we want to have girls but because we want to make the job accessible for them.”
It is a position that Victoria would like to see more restaurants take.
“The problem is always the same for women – they don’t stay because it is difficult to have a family if you work in this kind of restaurant. I have chefs who only work during the day because they have a family, and I make that possible for them.”
As someone who has risen through the ranks with flair and determination, Chef Victoria Vallenilla has this advice: “Never be ashamed to be straightforward, of looking for the best, of wanting to find perfection and complete accomplishment,” she reveals. “When you start to do that, the pressure is gone. I stopped being scared about what people think. We each have a voice and if people around us don’t like what we are saying, bad luck.”
And there’s no doubt that this feisty, passionate and confident South American attitude translates perfectly on to the plate.
“She makes the job look easy,” concludes General Manager Eric Gorjux. “She runs the kitchens with an iron fist in a velvet glove.”
The Sixty Nine, supported by the International University of Monaco, is creating the next generation of future leaders and a platform for the intelligent gig-economy. Matching success-led projects from innovative companies with carefully selected ambitious students, The Sixty Nine aims to be the Fiverr of internships.
Interns using The Sixty Nine platform are able to search for business projects and find like-minded members who they pitch with as working groups called “Tribes”. Once successful, they have 69 days to complete the project and hit the commercial objectives set by the company who provided it.
Supported by leaders identified as being progressive on diversity, sustainability, innovation and purpose from some of world’s largest brands, the interns access a programme which includes female empowerment, yoga, story-telling, mindfulness, wealth management and champagne tasting; professional immersions not covered by other institutions.
Companies pay a success fee on completion which is split between the Tribe, The Sixty Nine, a charity and also funding a relevant vocational trip; creating an eco-system which benefits businesses, interns, communities and the planet.
“Throughout history, universities have naturally focused on being best at academia and companies have focused primarily on their commercial activities,” said Craig Neale, Chief Marketing and Commercial Officer of The Sixty Nine. “With the gig-economy rising and ambitious young talent wanting to forge their own paths, we see that gap widening and see our role as creating the eco-system which brings the best of those parts together, alongside leaders of brands. It gives us a moral responsibility to not just provide gigs or projects but also to develop the next generation of conscious leaders and talent who are equipped with the skills to change the narrative on female empowerment, sustainability and innovation.”
With previous roles at Aston Martin, Sky and Warner Bros, he says “We’ve blended influences from Uber, Soho House, Vogue and LinkedIn to define the new face of intelligent luxury at a time whereby everything needs to be online. Allowing ambitious young talent to work together from any part of the world, whether in their home, university or office, and at any hour of the day, creates a platform which establishes the eco-system for the intelligent gig economy in ways which current gig platforms such as UpWork and Fiverr cannot.”
Since March 2020, the number of internships proposed to our students has fallen by 60%, as companies had difficulties to forecast activities, and were not able to ‘welcome’ interns in their offices. We had to find innovative new ways to operate, both with online learning and initiatives like The Sixty Nine,” said Sophie de Lorenzo, Director of Career Services and Corporate Relations at The International University of Monaco. “This opportunistic cooperation, developed to face a punctual crisis, might be the first step of a complementary proposal, coming in addition to company internships for students willing and able to work on business projects in a 100% virtual setting.”
With plans to expand to other universities and professional settings later in 2021 and goals to scale into multiple major cities, The Sixty Nine aim to open up new opportunities for students, alumni, parents who wish to balance childcare arrangements with work, entrepreneurs, freelancers and all intelligent communities, wherever they wish to work from.
Monaco Life with press release
The pools for the final Tokyo 2020 Olympics qualifying tournament in rugby sevens, the World Rugby Sevens Repechage, have been drawn ahead of the competition taking place next month in Monaco.
With 21 of 24 total teams already chosen for the Rugby World Sevens competition, the final qualification rounds will be held in the Principality at the Louis II Stadium on 19th to 20th June with two women’s and one men’s team getting the last of the golden tickets to the Olympic Games in Japan this summer.
The women’s competition will see 12 teams battling it out. There are three pools with four teams each and the top two teams in each pool, plus the two third-placed teams with the highest point totals will qualify for the knockout stages.
Pool A pits Russia, Argentina, Mexico and Samoa against each other, with Pool B featuring teams from Papua New Guinea, Kazakhstan, Jamaica and Tunisia. Pool C is the most interesting, though, with France and Columbia, the only two teams to have qualified for the 2016 Games in Rio in the list, paired with Madagascar and Hong Kong.
The men’s tournaments have a slightly different configuration, with two pools featuring five teams each. Teams will play against all four opponents in their pools with the top two teams from each pool progressing through two knockout stages, culminating in a winner being decided in the final.
The men’s pools consist of Samoa, Ireland, Tonga, Zimbabwe and Mexico in a strong Pool A, and France, Hong Kong, Chile, Uganda and Jamaica in tough Pool B.
“I would like to thank His Serene Highness Prince Albert II, the Monaco Rugby Union and the Monaco authorities for putting on an excellent draw, which sets the tone for an exciting event and brings us a step closer to a fantastic showcase of rugby sevens at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games,” said World Rugby Vice-Chairman Bernard Laporte. “We will now work closely with teams involved in the final qualification event to ensure they all arrive with the best-possible preparation in Monaco in June. Together with the Monegasque Rugby Union, we will continue to focus on delivering a safe, secure and thrilling event that puts the welfare of everyone involved at the centre of our operations.”
Gareth Wittstock, Monegasque Rugby Union Chairman, went on to say, “The draw has delivered some fascinating fixtures and all eyes now turn to 19th to 20th June and an exciting Repechage event at the Stade Louis II. Preparations are well underway, and we are now looking forward to hosting the 22 teams involved in Monaco in a safe and secure environment.”
Support from the International Olympic Committee to the tune of US$4 million (€3.3 million) has helped prepare the teams for the Olympics through Olympic qualified unions’ sevens programmes as well as going toward the costs of hosting a number of high-performance preparation events.
The final games will be played out in Japan on 26th to 28th July for the men followed by the women on 29th to 31st July at the Tokyo Stadium. The event is thought to be one of the biggest draws of the Olympic Games, following the success of the Rugby World Cup 2019 hosted by the Japanese, and which converted the island nation, and indeed many other parts of Asia, into huge rugby enthusiasts as shown by the record-breaking broadcast viewership.
Monaco Life with AS Monaco Basketball press release, photo by AS Monaco Basketball
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