Sommelier and co-owner of Taverna del Capitano in Marina del Cantone, she curates a 15,000-label wine list and an award-winning dining-room service. A benchmark for Campania’s hospitality, since 2016 she has been one of Italy’s most respected voices on front-of-house culture.
Raised in the Caputo family’s “house of the Captain,” among nets, daily catch and bottles annotated in pencil, she chose the dining room when the family restaurant became a daily workshop. She left piano and Economics to follow the path at home: AIS courses, study, tastings. She became First Sommelier of Campania and took 2nd place at the 1994 “Best Sommelier of Italy.” She is a professional sommelier and AIS lecturer, with a focus on dessert-wine pairing.
To refine technique and pastry sensibility, she worked in the kitchens of Gualtiero Marchesi in Milan and Antonio Sciullo in Rome, then at Étoile in Venice. In parallel she cultivated olive oil: since 1990 she has been a master miller and served on the tasting panel of the Ercole Olivario award, deepening the lexicon and sensory analysis of extra-virgin olive oil.
In Nerano, her cellar has grown to around 15,000 bottles, with depth on Campania, Italy and major European terroirs: in 2000 L’Espresso named it “Cellar of the Year,” acknowledging a long-built selection of verticals and rare vintages.
The family restaurant—today holding one MICHELIN Star, with a seafood-driven kitchen led by Alfonso Caputo—is the stage where Mariella orchestrates the rhythm of service and the narrative of wine. The dining room faces the gulf; the by-the-glass path follows the catch and Mediterranean seasonality. Maître d’ is her husband, Claudio Di Mauro: a family engine that binds welcome and precision.
In 2006 L’Espresso Guide named her “Maître of the Year”—with the motivation: competence, professionalism and style. Ten years later came the “Identità di Sala” award in Milan, sealing an idea of hospitality that puts the guest at the center and the bottle at the service of the dish.
Since 2013 she has been active at Parabere Forum, an international platform for female leadership in food, bringing the Sorrentine shoreline’s experience into a global debate on inclusion, work and sustainability. Since 2022 she has served as Vice President of the Associazione Italiana Ambasciatori del Gusto, a role confirmed in 2025: an institutional commitment that translates the dining-room vision into a cultural policy of taste.
Day to day her signature remains measure: service timing, wine temperature, attention to detail. Taverna del Capitano today alternates fine dining on the rooftop with the home-style cooking of “Casa Caputo” at sea level: two registers, one common thread of maritime terroir and guest listening.
