Her message is one of empowerment: “If you achieve something, thank yourself. We women often forget to do that.”

Chiara Pannozzo is a formidable young chef, 31 and in the full bloom of youth, born in Terracina, between the sun and sea of the Agro Pontino coast. A face like… okay, let’s admit it, like Elisabetta Canalis, complete with a charming gap between her front teeth, hair down to her waist (left loose only when the stoves fall silent), and a second skin of tattoos that serve as a punk manifesto of their own. “Without them, I’d be naked, ordinary.”

But above all, she is a woman who has made it by transforming her fragilities into strength and determination. Through hard work, talent, attentiveness and discipline, she survived nightmare kitchens before finding her place in the world. 

With a mind in constant creative motion, Chiara is now in a period of transition. Until January, she will continue her work at Bue Nero in Verona, a steakhouse run by the Dalfini family (renowned for their quality meats). In just a couple of years, she has brought the restaurant recognition with her highly personal interpretation of cuts of meat and her visceral love for offal, the kind of stuff that scares the faint of heart but that she turns into poetry.