Salvatore’s parents and older sister, Elisabetta, had immigrated to England after the Second World War when the country recruited thousands of southern Italian labourers in order to aid the reconstruction boom. Food was a key part of Salvatore’s life from a very young age. From the age of 11, he would cook for his family so there was dinner on the table when they returned home from work.

Having run a number of coffee shops and food establishments during the 1970s, in 1984 Salvatore decided to open up a patisserie. He noticed that there was nowhere for Bedford’s large Italian and cosmopolitan population to enjoy the mouth-watering tastes of Italian and European baking. He named the patisserie La Rondine, which is the Italian word for ‘The Swallow’.