Alila Kothaifaru Maldives is bringing a slice of Milan to the Indian Ocean next year. From 25 October to 3 November 2026, Chef Joshua Acquaviva, Head Chef of Pellico 3 at Park Hyatt Milan, will take over the resort's beachside Italian restaurant, Pibati Sul Mare, for a ten-day residency.

Acquaviva's CV is serious. Born in Naples in 1995, he worked his way through kitchens that include VistaMare at Hotel Il Fogliano, where he helped the restaurant win its first Michelin star, two-starred Kresios in Telese, and four years as Sous Chef at Il Faro di Capo d'Orso on the Amalfi Coast. He joined Pellico 3 in 2022 and made it to Head Chef within two years.

At Kothaifaru, he'll cook alongside Executive Chef Frank Wackerhagen and the island team, with a menu built around his Neapolitan roots — pasta and pizza above all. The idea, per the resort, isn't to transplant Milan onto the beach but to let the two kitchens meet: Italian technique and foundations, with island-grown herbs and produce from Kothaifaru working their way into the dishes.

The restaurant itself is a fitting stage. Pibati Sul Mare takes its name from the Sanskrit word for 'to drink or absorb', and runs a menu of artisanal pizzas and handcrafted pastas with your feet essentially in the sand.

The most hands-on part: intimate pizza-making sessions at the restaurant counter, capped at eight guests each, where you'll work the dough and get one-to-one time with the chefs. Extra sessions will run if demand warrants, but everything is subject to availability — reservations well in advance are advised via kothaifaru@alilahotels.com.

For travellers, this is a good example of where Maldives dining is heading: resorts increasingly treating food as the headline act, not an add-on to the snorkelling. If you're already weighing a 2026 Maldives trip and care about what's on the plate, timing your stay to late October could mean eating a Milan-trained chef's pasta a few metres from the lagoon — and learning to stretch dough with him the next day. It suits food-driven travellers who like their luxury low-key and personal rather than formal, which is exactly the pitch the resort's GM makes here.

Worth noting the wider context: this isn't an isolated event. The Maldives' 2026-27 season is stacked with guest chefs — Hideaway Beach Resort has Japanese chef Kanji Kobayashi of Villa Aida doing six-course dinners in November 2026, and Park Hyatt Hadahaa is launching a season-long Masters of Food & Wine series starting with Michelin-starred Cantonese chef Ku Chi Fai in October 2026. If a chef residency can tip a booking decision, the Maldives is making it easier than ever.

Maldives Insider