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From the very beginning, Johanne Killeen and George Germon have made culinary history, receiving nearly every honor, award, and public recognition for their original, innovative cuisine. Johanne and George are chefs/owners of Al Forno Restaurant, which opened in Providence in January 1980. Al Forno, which literally means “from the oven,” was inspired by the opulence and style of Northern Italy’s fine cuisine, which makes extensive use of wood-burning ovens or open-flame grills.
Killeen and Germon became enamored of Italian cuisine when they lived and traveled throughout Italy. Johanne worked in a tiny restaurant outside of Florence, and George taught for Rhode Island School of Design’s European Honors Program in Rome at Palazzo Cenci. The couple’s training in the fine arts, Killeen as a photographer and Germon as a sculptor and architect, is reflected in the sense of design displayed in the restaurant’s interior as well as in the creative presentation of their dishes.
As Johanne explains: “For us, our restaurant, Al Forno, is simply an art project that keeps evolving. The kitchen is our studio, and the food we cook is like a canvas that is continually being repainted, changed, and refined. Food is eaten the way art is perceived; it is digested and recorded. Given the right circumstances, a connection is made and communication takes place, which is what art is all about.”
Indeed, the food that Killeen and Germon serve at Al Forno has led to national recognition for the husband/wife team. They are most famous for inventing grilled pizza, and in recent years, have garnered international acclaim, catching the culinary world’s attention with their oven-baked pasta dishes, vegetable combinations fragrant with garlic, olive oil, and Mediterranean herbs, and their superb desserts all cooked to order with the freshest ingredients.
Al Forno has earned prestigious accolades including: one of the “Best Regional Restaurants’ in America according to John Mariani of Playboy; Esquire named Al Forno one of the best new eateries; Conde Nast Traveler gave Al Forno their “Distinguished Restaurants of North America” award, and Nation’s Restaurant News gave Al Forno the Hall of Fame Award. In addition, GQ Magazine presented their “Golden Dish’ award to the restaurant for their outstanding Lemon Meringue Tart. On a most impressive note, Patricia Wells writing for the The International Herald Tribune’s “World’s Best Restaurants” selected Al Forno as “Number One” in the world for Casual Dining. USA Today named Johanne Killeen, one of the top twenty women chefs in the country. She is a founding member of The International Association of Women Chefs and Restaurateurs group (WCR). Food and Wine named Johanne and George two of The Ten Best Chefs in America, while the James Beard Foundation named them “Rising Stars of America”, and later “Great Regional Chefs”. In 1993, the Foundation honored them with the award for “Best Chef in the Northeast”. Killeen and Germon have been inducted into the Johnson and Wales University’s “Hall of Fame” as “Distinguished Visiting Chefs”. Their peers have also honored the two chefs with the prestigious “Ivy Award”. In 1999 the restaurant was recipient of the “Insegna del Ristorante Italiano” granted to select Italian restaurants abroad by the Italian Ministries of Agriculture and of Foreign Trade and in the same year, Johanne and George received Honorary Doctorates in Culinary Arts from Johnson and Wales University.
These culinary artists have featured in Food and Wine, Bon Appetit, The New York Times, Glamour, Esquire, New England Monthly, Metropolitan Home, Boston Globe, USA Today, Family Circle, Conde Nast Traveler, House Beautiful, New England Living and Fine Cooking. Additional features include a profile of the chefs by Bryan Miller in The New York Times, and several articles by Alison Arnett of The Boston Globe who
bestowed on Al Forno her highest four-star rating given only to those deserving the description “extraordinary.” The Ladies Home Journal also featured the couple in an article with Julia Child who discusses her TV series “In Julia’s Kitchen with Master Chefs”.
In October 1997, Killeen and Germon were the subjects of Molly O’Neill’s “Food” in The New York Times Magazine. Their Thanksgiving recipes were the subject of Coastal Living’s November ‘97 feature article, and their article “ A Cozy but Elegant Christmas Dinner” appeared in the January ‘98 issue of Fine Cooking.
Johanne Killeen and George Germon have shared their techniques in cooking classes around the world. In the U. S., they have taught at DeGustibus at Macy’s in New York City; Bristol Farms, Draeger’s and Fetzer Vineyards in California, and La Varenne at the Greenbrier in West Virginia. They have appeared on several television cooking shows such as Sara Moulton’s Cooking Live Primetime, Martha Stewart Living TV, and Julia Child’s Cooking with Master Chefs and Baking with Julia. Internationally, they have conducted classes for Seabourn Cruise Lines in Asia and the Mediterranean. In Italy, they teach regularly for the Wine and Culinary Center at the Capezzana Estate in Tuscany, the Hotel Cipriani in Venice, and the Regaleali Wine Estate in Sicily with Anna Tasca Lanza.
In 1991, Killeen and Germon wrote a James Beard award-winning cookbook, CUCINA SIMPATICA: Robust Trattoria Cooking, published by HarperCollins, NYC. The book catalogues their romance with quality ingredients, and their acute instinct and skill in creating meals that enhance the fine flavor of each ingredient. The recipes in CUCINA SIMPATICA are based on the dishes served at Al Forno. Their second cookbook, On Top of Spaghetti… .Macaroni, Linguine, Penne and Pasta of Every Kind, was released by
HarperCollins (William Morris Cookbooks) in November 2006. This book is a celebration of the love affair George and Johanne have had with pasta for several decades.
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