A carefully chosen wine can change the way a dish tastes. At Somnium, a restaurant and gastronomic experience in Eboli, Southern Italy, this familiar idea of pairing is expanded far beyond the plate.
What happens when the surroundings become part of the pairing too?
Designed for only 16 guests, Somnium takes dining beyond the traditional restaurant setting. Food interacts with architecture, sound, projections, art, historical references and digital technology as the experience unfolds across different environments.
The intention is not to surround dinner with spectacle for its own sake. Somnium makes an important distinction: technology is not the protagonist. Cuisine is. Everything around it is intended to add another layer of meaning to what is being eaten.
In this expanded form of pairing, flavour, aroma and texture meet space, movement, visual perception, expectation and surprise.
How Would the Past Taste Through the Present — or Even the Future?
Historical cuisine often looks backwards, attempting to recreate what people once ate. But what if the ingredients, techniques and traditions of the past became starting points for something new? At Somnium, this question unfolds through a tasting experience that moves across centuries — from ancient history towards an imagined future.
Its roots lie in Campania, the southern Italian region that includes Naples, Pompeii and the Amalfi Coast. The region's cuisine has been shaped over centuries by migration, invasion and cultural exchange. Ancient Rome, the Longobards, Arabs, Normans, Angevins, Spanish and Bourbons become chapters in a narrative that traces these influences through food.
This is where documented history gives way to speculation. The vision of Pompeii projected into a distant future reflects that shift, taking the narrative beyond what is known and into what might yet be possible.
Food, however, is only one part of how this idea unfolds. Guests move through the Thermopolium, Popina and Officina, where architecture, sound, art, projections and digital elements become part of the experience.
Rather than a fixed collection of dishes, Somnium is conceived as an evolving project. Research and experimentation continue as the kitchen explores new historical connections, techniques and ideas, allowing the menu itself to evolve over time.
Without revealing the experience course by course, the restaurant’s work with laganon offers a glimpse into how this research can translate onto the plate. Laganon was an ancient Greek preparation based on sheets or strips of dough. As Greek culture entered into dialogue with Roman civilisation, the idea evolved into laganum and, through centuries of further transformation, became part of the genealogy of what we recognise today as lasagna. Here, that familiar endpoint becomes another beginning: if a dish has already travelled through cultures, ingredients and techniques for centuries, where might it go next?
Guests can currently choose between three tasting experiences:
“20,000 BC – 2126 AD” — 17 courses — €175
“20,000 BC – 2125 AD” — 16 courses — €155
“20,000 BC – 2125 AD – FLORA FUTURA” — 16-course vegetarian experience — €155
The difference is not simply the number of courses. Each menu is conceived as a different way of travelling through the same gastronomic universe.
Backstage: Where Ideas Take Shape
Behind the projections, imagined futures and shifting environments is a very real working kitchen. This is where Somnium’s less visible transformations take place — through preparation, experimentation and a considerable amount of precision.
It is an intriguing contrast. What may appear almost theatrical to the guest relies on a highly technical kitchen, where unusual ideas still have to become dishes that can be prepared and served with consistency.
The team works with fermentation and preservation alongside technologies including freeze-drying, Girovap vacuum distillation, liquid nitrogen, OCOO, Josper cooking and a cryogenic plate reaching approximately –200°C.
Technology continues outside the kitchen through projections and a multimedia table that allow the physical environment to change alongside the menu. But its role remains deliberately secondary: sometimes visible, sometimes almost invisible, it is there to support the experience rather than become the experience itself.
Who Brings It to Life? Meet the Chef Behind the Vision
At the centre of the project is Chef Patron Pasquale Trotta. His route to Somnium has taken him through very different culinary worlds: from Lucas Carton in Paris with Alain Senderens and Oliver Glowig in Rome to five years at La Pergola with Heinz Beck, where his work included Research & Development.
He later worked with Heston Blumenthal and undertook stages at Alchemist with Rasmus Munk and Enigma with Albert Adrià — experiences spanning classical foundations, technique, research, creativity and a very different understanding of how food can interact with the wider experience of a guest.
At Somnium, those influences meet Trotta’s own research into Campania and the civilisations that shaped it. But bringing that idea to life is not the work of one person. Behind the 16-seat experience is a team responsible for the kitchen, preparation, service and the coordination required to make all of those moving parts appear seamless.
Perhaps that is the final transformation: behind an experience designed to feel unfamiliar and unpredictable are real people doing remarkably precise work.
Visiting Somnium
Somnium is located at Via Cupe Superiore 18, 84025 Eboli (SA), Italy, and is open for dinner from Wednesday to Saturday, 20:00–21:30.
Reservations are made online through Somnium’s ticketing system. The booking calendar is updated daily and currently allows reservations up to 30 days in advance. A ticket is required for each guest, with its value applied to the final bill; beverages are excluded.
Guests with allergies or severe intolerances are asked to contact the restaurant before booking. Somnium is not suitable for children under 14.
More information on: https://www.restaurantsomnium.it/
Reservations: Book Somnium
