Marco Genna
Private chef and sommelier, based in Cluj-Napoca, Romania.
I am Sicilian. I learned to cook at home, from my father, before I learned it anywhere else. Then I went to a hospitality school in Assisi, in Umbria, and after that I spent ten years in restaurants — Umbria, Tuscany, Emilia, back in Sicily, then Amsterdam, Cork, Berlin, London. After London came Spain: two years in Altea, on the Costa Blanca, and then Tenerife.
I came to Romania and stayed. I reached the final of MasterChef Romania. Today I cook privately in Cluj-Napoca, run live cooking at events, and consult for restaurants that need a menu their kitchen can actually make.
I do not follow many recipes. I follow some, and then I mix in everything else. I like to play, to take a risk, to put flavours together that are not supposed to go together. Living in as many countries as I have makes that easier — and the Balkan and Transylvanian years widened it more than any of the others.
Which is why I do not hand people a fixed card. I write a bespoke menu: built around whoever is eating, on the night they are eating it.
The route
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Sicily
Learned at home
Grew up in a house where cooking was taught by his father.
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Assisi, Umbria
Hospitality school
Trained at a hospitality school in Assisi.
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Ten years
Italy and Europe
Restaurants across Umbria, Tuscany, Emilia and Sicily, then Amsterdam, Cork and Berlin.
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London
Notting Hill
Started at the bottom and ended up running the place — two management jobs, back to back. He left when the pace stopped being worth it.
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Two years
Spain
Altea, on the Costa Blanca, in a Mediterranean kitchen built on Sicilian and Spanish cooking — then Tenerife. Spanish is still one of the three cuisines he keeps coming back to.
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Romania
MasterChef finalist
Reached the final of MasterChef Romania.
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Bucovina, August 2026
Festivalul Trufelor
Cooked live at the Truffle Festival in Cacica, paella in pans the size of a table, for the thousands who came through.
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Now, Cluj-Napoca
Private chef and consultant
Cooks privately, runs events, and consults for restaurants — most recently a three-month engagement building an à la carte menu with full food costing.