Who is Fellipe Zanuto, owner of A Pizza da Mooca, a Brazilian restaurant on the list of the best in the world

If you turn on the television on a Friday night, you may well find Fellipe Zanuto, alongside Dani Calabresa, presenting the new reality show What a beautiful pizza! broadcast on GNT. The position of juror did not arrive for nothing: Fellipe is the creator and responsible for the Mooca’s Pizza the pizzeria that conquered 85th place in the 50 Top Pizza awards – a world ranking that was announced yesterday, September 13, in Napoli, Italy.

With two units – one in the Mooca of course, and another in Pine trees – the pizzeria was Fellipe’s first business, which is also restaurant owner Inn from the Roman style pizzeria Da Mooca Pizza Shop and the São Paulo-style pizzeria, those full of toppings, Onestta.

the entrepreneurial streak

His talent for gastronomy came from a very common story: he hated eating instant noodles when he traveled with friends and, so, he always took over the cooking and the group’s meals. However, when choosing a course, gastronomy was not her first option.

Due to his family history of entrepreneurs, Fellipe believed that the only course he should take was administration. One year was enough for him to realize that gastronomy was his great love.

“A friend of mine, encouraged by me, went to eat at Senac. Once I went to visit him and I fell in love with the course”, he says, who, even so, never got the idea out of his head that he would have to undertake – but now he knew it was something in the gastronomic sector.

Upon finishing gastronomy college at Anhembi Morumbi, he had a conversation with Rosa Moraes responsible for implementing the first higher education course in Gastronomy in Brazil and a reference in training professionals for the sector, which changed his life.

“She recommended a course at Le Cordon Bleu, in Sydney, Australia, focused on hospitality in Food and Beverage. For a year, from 9am to 4pm, I was there in a suit and tie learning how to run a food business,” she recalls. On the flight back to Brazil, Fellipe’s head was a whirlwind of ideas.

went to work with Pascal Valero , at the now-defunct KAA restaurant, thanks to its reputation for having a disciplined kitchen. “I was very unfocused. Gastronomy made me more focused, everything is very precise,” he comments. At the same time as working at KAA, Fellipe held events to raise money to start his own business: private, social and corporate dinners that earned him good money to then set up his much-desired business.

Suddenly….pizzeria owner!

The story of pizza parachuted into Fellipe’s life. His stepfather – a passionate about gastronomy – opened a pizzeria in Mooca and called Zanuto for a consultancy.

“One day my stepfather called me and said: this restaurant business is not for me. I don’t know what to do when the pizzaiolo is missing”, he recalls with a laugh.

“I inherited the pizzeria overnight. And I didn’t even want to have a pizzeria! I wanted to be a chef and have my restaurant along the lines I learned in Australia. Pizza didn’t have any glamour, what had glamour, at the time, was molecular gastronomy.” Not knowing if he would have another opportunity to undertake, Zanuto embraced the opportunity.