At Sails Restaurant in Naples, chef de cuisine Rajkumar ‘Raj’ Holuss laces slices of beets, tightly folding one vermillion disc in front of another until a rose emerges. Soft squares of feta cheese cradle the bloom like clouds. Ribbons of cucumber curl into the folds with tangerine-hued moscato vinaigrette drizzled over. For another dish, Raj lines butter-bathed Dover sole with scallions, creating a thin emerald trail from tail to tip. The burst of color creates a dish as striking as it is refined.
Across the region, chefs delight in composing flavors on the plate. Like painters, chefs use color and composition to evoke emotion and tell stories. But, instead of oils and acrylics, they have food ingredients, and dinnerware replaces the canvas.
Before arriving at Sails in 2023, Raj worked under renowned French chef Michel Roux Jr. at the two-Michelin-starred (now shuttered) Le Gavroche in London. There, Raj learned to see color as a measure of perfection. “Your lemon tart isn’t yellow enough; your onion soup is not dark enough,” Michel would say as Raj made the same dishes again and again. Through repetition, the young chef came to understand that color reveals the soul of a dish: the brilliant yellow of perfectly ripe lemons, the deep amber achieved through patient caramelization.“Anyone can cook these dishes, but real emotion is only achieved when the right ingredients bring the right color and balance,” he says.
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Courtesy Sails Restaurant
sails beet salad
Imaginative chefs turn dining into a visual experience. At Naples’ Sails Restaurant, the beet salad folds the sliced root vegetable into the shape of a rose. Hyde N Chic Restaurant’s cacio e pepe deconstructs the classic, with caramelized hearts of palm and a textured Parmesan crisp atop. “The food before us speaks without language,” chef Andy Hyde says.
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Photography by Brian Tietz
In Sails’ organic beet salad, what could be chaotic, with bold hues from opposite sides of the color wheel fighting for attention, becomes harmonious through intentional placement. The central flower anchors the composition. Moscato vinaigrette pools on the sides, flowing over peeled grapes that brighten the plate, like small orange suns. It complements cucumber ribbons and the rose’s deep-purple petals.
Gavin Makava, of Naples-based caterer The Rose House, is similarly fascinated with color. He lets his experience as a painter guide his approach. “When I paint and when I cook, I am understanding myself in a new way,” says the South African chef, whose visual art honors traditional African forms through tribal designs. “South Africa is a Rainbow Nation for a reason; it is a life lived in color.”
Gavin’s dishes burst with the same expressive energy. He considers how plating can capture emotion and sense of place. For a recent tasting menu, titled Sea of Illusion, Gavin drew from the shores of Alaska, where he travels to cook in remote camps each summer. In the first course, a gel sphere injected with seaweed miso casts verdant light upon a cream-colored scallop shell, and toasted breadcrumbs spill like sand across the plate. The next course—a salad of fresh greens lightly dressed in lime, yuzu, a sprinkle of edible flowers and a delicate seafoam—evokes a fog-cloaked, oceanside garden.
Diners can see the artistry in action at Liberty. The chefs’ counter overlooks the Fort Myers restaurant’s open kitchen, revealing a symphony of sizzling oil and clanking pans as owner Bob Boye and his cousin, Richee, construct with layer after layer of flavor and technique in fluid movements. They study a speckled gray dish, then swirl a spoonful of sweet potato mash around the edges in one long, languid stroke. Honey-roasted duck is sliced, then arranged into the center atop the ochre-colored mash, its warm hue blurring with the golden crackling and drawing the eye to the rose-colored meat. The contrast between crispy skin and tender flesh adds another dimension, with texture working in harmony with color.
“Like an artist, you get the brush in your hand, and you just know,” Bob says. “We have our flavors; now, how can we best present them? How can we play with color, depth and texture so there’s a visual experience, as well?” In their carpaccio, a rich emulsion wreaths the tightly layered beef in concentric circles. A cauliflower curry shines with lightly pickled grapes across the golden surface, their deep plum hue announcing vibrant flavors.
The plates themselves are objects of art at The Bohemian Restaurant in Bonita Springs, where Brandon Schewe experiments with textures, sourcing artisan dinnerware with distinctive shapes or Indigenous provenance. Local snapper ceviche, bathed in lime and yellow aji amarillo peppers, is served in Peruvian stoneware, honoring the recipe’s roots while being functional. The earthen vessel helps retain the chill, ensuring the dish is enjoyed as intended.
Sous vide coconut custard is presented in a mushroom-shaped ceramic bowl, with its column-like stalk extending nearly a foot from the table. The top curves like an outstretched hand, a final gesture of thanks from chef to diner at the end of the meal. “The dish should expand the plate’s story,” Brandon says. “These little bowls reckon so much.”
At Hyde N Chic, a ceramic coconut shell cradles a course affectionately titled My Childhood Breakfast. As a boy in Ghana, chef-owner Andy Hyde often ate garri, a traditional West African hot cereal made from cassava flour, out of a hollowed coconut. At his Naples restaurant, the ancient grain is milled to resemble grits, paired with Nigerian prawns and chili peppers and topped with shaved truffles and macadamia nuts—an elevated reimagining of the dish, connecting Ghanaian tradition with U.S. Southern shrimp and grits.
Andy, who trained in Germany and refined his craft at three-Michelin-starred Alinea—the temple of perspective-shifting presentations—in Chicago, merges formal technique with a poet’s vision. What was once a series of conscious choices, from color to texture, now forms through inspired instinct. “I can create a dish without ever tasting it,” he says. “The flavors tell the story, and the plate signals it.”
To evoke a German pastoral, Andy uses liquid nitrogen, with the fog rising from the bowl’s base, carrying the aroma of an ocean-swept countryside before dissipating over a bed of oysters and pine cones. The mollusks, smoked inside the conifers, are slick with brine atop a pesto Tuscan kale sauce. “I see food, much like art, as a tool that can bring people together to go places they might not otherwise go,” the chef says. “The food before us speaks without language.”
Photo credits for gallery above: Courtesy The Rose House (3), Sails Restaurant; Scott McIntyre (3), Karl Rouwhorst, Vanessa Rogers