Giacomino Drago is the youngest of eight children from the small town of Galati Mamertino in Sicily’s Messina region where the family grew and made almost everything they ate; from pressing olives to make olive oil, to making fresh cheeses, to watching his father make wine from their own vineyards.

Even before the age of 11, when Giacomino began cooking at the family’s area restaurant Portella Gazzana until the age of 16, Giacomino showed great interest in the family kitchen experimenting with risotto from locally harvested Porcini mushrooms, even though his first few attempts didn’t exactly pan out.