One Year Later: Welcome to Casa Manifiesto — Today I Don't Cook

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Steps

1. 1
   Giacomo opens the video reflecting on the past year — one year after first revealing his private life and work to the public when he joined the TV program 'El Gran Chef Famosos' on Latina, losing his anonymity. He credits his YouTube channel (launched February 2021, now at 700,000+ subscribers) for connecting him with families, cooks, and entrepreneurs worldwide.

   Tip: His original target audience was culinary students and food entrepreneurs, but he discovered over time that he was really speaking to entire families — something he considers deeply meaningful given his own family values.
2. 2
   Giacomo introduces Casa Manifiesto: a space conceived as a 'manifiesto' — a public declaration about gastronomy. He explains the concept was developed with architect Fiorela Milla León, who understood his cooking style, passion, and vision for transmitting culinary knowledge. Before this space existed he filmed in a restaurant where he held shares, then briefly at home (which stressed his cats Pepe and Hueso), and later in the kitchen of his late mentor Chef Jack Benois.

   Tip: Casa Manifiesto serves multiple purposes simultaneously: YouTube filming, Reels and branded content production, menu design consultancy, cookbook photography, and private dinners.
3. 3
   Tour of the reception room and library. Giacomo highlights his book collection as a core source of culinary knowledge, singling out Modernist Cuisine ('in the next 50 years no cooking book will be better — read all five volumes and you become a real cook'), a book on Italian popular cuisine ('Big Mama Cucina Popolare') he is using for a Montreal italo-Peruvian restaurant project, a book on Tacna's history and folklore gifted by Nelly Rossinelli, and a cherished first edition from El Celler de Can Roca personally signed by Joan Roca on the day Giacomo left.

   Tip: Giacomo also displays a quote frame 'Tened confianza, seréis peruanos' — a leaflet pasted on the walls of Tacna during the 49-year Chilean occupation, symbolizing Peruvian cultural resistance.
4. 4
   Giacomo shares his vision for the reception room as a future podcast and interview space, where he plans to host representatives of Peruvian gastronomy, artists, singers, and actors he has met through 'El Gran Chef Famosos'. He sees gastronomy as a unifying force and wants this room to reflect that.
5. 5
   Tour of the dining room. Giacomo pours a glass of wine and reflects on Tacna's wine-making culture (historically the largest wine exporter in South America before Spanish colonial trade restrictions redirected production toward pisco), his Italian heritage in Tacna, and the importance of celebrating life's small joys — a glass of wine, good food, shared space with people you love.

   Tip: Tacna's wine culture stems from the large Italian immigrant community that settled there. As the poet Freddy Gambeta wrote: 'No hay tacneño bautizado sin vino' (There is no baptized Tacneño without wine).
6. 6
   Giacomo delivers a motivational message to young people: commit to what you love, feed your passion, it is worth giving everything you have. If done with integrity — without harming others, doing things well, and leaving something meaningful behind — life rewards you. 'Of what use is what you know if you don't share it?' He acknowledges his team of cooks and administrators as essential to managing his many responsibilities.

   Tip: His philosophy on passing through life: 'Pasar por esta vida sin dejar nada' (Passing through this life without leaving anything) is the failure to avoid. Teach, share, transcend.
7. 7
   Tour of the kitchen — the heart of Casa Manifiesto. Giacomo describes the professional SMEG range with high-pressure burners, stone countertop (chosen by his partner Brenda for visual aesthetics on camera — white stone that makes dishes 'look bad' is avoided), a convection oven, and a combination steam/convection oven. He explains how the combi oven uses a water reservoir probe to inject steam, allowing long hours of steam cooking. A giant mural of a chef's knife decorates the kitchen wall — a reproduction of the knife tattooed on Giacomo's arm at age 24 as a personal commitment to his culinary vocation during grueling 12–16 hour workdays.

   Tip: In French culinary tradition, the kitchen stove is called 'le piano' because it is where the music of the kitchen team is made. Giacomo honors this tradition at Casa Manifiesto.
8. 8
   Giacomo closes by sharing memories of his late mentor Chef Jack Benois — specifically a four-hands dinner ('cena a cuatro manos') they hosted at his first restaurant, which Benois playfully titled 'Cena a cuatro manos… o 19 dedos y medio' (Dinner for four hands… or 19 and a half fingers) because a childhood ice-carving accident had left him with a permanently bent finger. He reflects that Benois taught him not only technique ('saber hacer') but character ('saber ser'). Giacomo closes the video standing in his new kitchen, grateful and energized for the next chapter.

   Tip: Marco Pierre White is another chef Giacomo cites as a long-time inspiration: 'If you have a dream, you have a duty to fulfill it — and to fulfill it requires discipline, effort, and work. Fall in love with the process, and peace — the closest thing to happiness — will follow.'

Giacomo Bocchio

UN AÑO DESPUÉS; LES PRESENTO CASA MANIFIESTO - HOY NO COCINO

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