Mario Magli was born in Varese, northern Italy and he started working at the age of 16 in the catering business as a commis chef.

To further his career Mario moved to London in 1997 and gained an enormous amount of experience working for various restaurants.

His first job was working for the chef Antonio Carluccio at the Neal Street restaurant and worked for Carluccio for two years.

While working at the Neal Street restaurant Mario met chef Gennaro Contaldo who left in 1999 to open his own restaurant in Charlotte Street called Passione.

Mario then went to work for Gennaro as Passione’s sous chef. With Gennaro being close friends of Jamie Oliver, an opportunity to go to work for Jamie Oliver in his old Street restaurant 15 came about and Mario worked at 15 for two years, returning to Passione in 2006 as their main chef.

Today Mario Magli is now chef and joint owner with manager Giorgio Pili of their own restaurant 500 along the Holloway Road.