Marco Visciola is the executive chef at Il Marin in Genoa. With a cuisine that blends ligurian tradition and modern techniques, he has led the restaurant to earn its first Michelin star in 2023.
Marco Visciola, class of 1985, was born in Bogliasco, a town on the Riviera di Levante. The sea in front and the land behind, land to cultivate and all the flavors, scents and colors of the Ligurian hinterland, "a vegetable garden suspended over the sea", as Marco likes to call his Liguria. He learned his love of cooking from his grandfather Giovanni, who was a cook and very attached to the ligurian tradition. A "personal chef" ante litteram, a banquet and home cook, his grandfather involved him in his adventures from an early age.
An electronics engineer by training, he began working summers as a dishwasher in restaurants. By the time he was 19, he was traveling between kitchens, learning the various nuances of traditional cuisine. Trofie with pesto, stuffed anchovies, cappon magro became an inseparable part of his gastronomic vocabulary. The turning point came at the age of 22, when he met Serenella Medone from Il Solito Posto in Bogliasco, and together they created the first restaurant that could be defined as fine dining. It was thanks to this collaboration that he entered the world of Eataly in Turin and began to lay the foundations of his training: from Enrico Crippa in Piazza Duomo in Alba and from Fabrizio Tesse at the Locanda d'Orta, he learned respect for raw materials and aesthetic taste; while overseeing the opening of Eataly Corea, he became familiar with asian ingredients and processing techniques such as fermentation, which he also introduced into his kitchen as cameos of taste.
After a few years in Turin, Eataly also opened in Genoa in 2011, and Marco returned to Liguria alongside Enrico Panero, the first chef of Il Marin; in 2015 he became executive chef of Il Marin and responsible for the entire restaurant section of Eataly Genoa. At the helm of Il Marin, over the years Visciola has defined, shaped and grown the restaurant in his own image: seafood cuisine with a contemporary flair, uncompromising quality, refined restraint, hospitality and comfort, so much so that in march 2023 he was awarded his first Michelin star.
