Domenico Carella

Domenico Carella was born in 1984 in Bernalda, a Lucanian village of around 10,000 inhabitants, and is from Lucania (Basilicata), a somewhat isolated region of southern Italy. He started cooking at eleven, driven by a childhood passion for hospitality. That passion was sparked as a teenager when he organised his brother's 18th birthday party at the family's country house.^[1]

At sixteen he opened his first bar, in his family's summer farmhouse, and with his brother Francesco ran a countryside kiosk offering cocktails and sandwiches. In a September 2025 interview Carella said his father had given him a kiosk to run at fifteen or sixteen, and that it grew into a bar, a pizzeria and a family agritourism business run by his brother. His first professional bar venture, Glam Lounge Cafè in Fernandina, opened in 2010.^[1],[2],[3]

The family's country house in Metaponto, Basilicata, grew into Senso Farm, which Carella co-founded and developed with his father and brother. A January 2021 interview gives the farmhouse as 10 hectares; a March 2023 interview describes a 15-hectare agritourism, banquet hall and drive-in estate. He left Senso Farm to his brother in 2014 to pursue career stimuli abroad.^[1]

Carella worked as a chef and pizza maker until the age of 25, when he discovered he was gluten intolerant and moved into the bar world. He describes his culinary and hospitality education as entirely self-taught, preferring self-directed learning to formal instruction, and began as a self-taught bartender. In a September 2025 interview he said his only formal bartending course was at Planet One in Bari.^[2],[3]

Abroad, he accumulated a decade of experience as a professional chef, bartender and manager: Bar Manager at 8½ Bombana, consultant for Dry Milano and for Bokan Canary Wharf in London, where he was Group Bar Manager, and beverage director of Pirata Group in Hong Kong, a group that grew from three venues to ten in just over a year. By the age of 36 he had worked on five continents, including redesigning the roof bar of Otto e Mezzo Bombana, the two-Michelin-starred restaurant in Shanghai. He adopted the nickname 'Dom' while working in Shanghai, because his Chinese colleagues found 'Domenico' difficult to pronounce.^[2],[4]

Carella is a founder of AKA Teas. He launched AKA's kombucha line as a Christmas product.^[5]

He is an entrepreneur and beverage consultant who created the Milan restaurant projects Carico and Ultra. He co-opened Carico Milano, a cocktail bar in the Navigli area of Milan, in February 2020 with Lorenzo Ferraboschi, opening the concept as Carico – Casual Risto Cocktail. In December 2023, Panorama reported that his headquarters had been at Carico in Milan since 2020. He is the owner of Carico Milano and Ultra, and the founder of The Martini Room and The Negroni Room.^{[1],[4],[5],[6],[7]}

He designs beverage creations intended to pair harmoniously with cuisine, and sometimes designs dishes shaped around a drink. His cocktails are built to be deliberately not challenging, with lightness given by moderate alcohol content and restrained use of sugars and acids.^[1],[3]

In 2013 he took part in the Campari Barman Competition in Bari, winning the regional stage and ranking among the top six national finalists. Accounts of his recognition in Asia vary: a February 2023 interview states that after three months in Shanghai he was named one of the five best bartenders of the year in Asia by That's Shanghai, while other sources record him as Bartender of the Year in Asia from That's Shanghai in 2015 and as Manager of the Year in Asia from the same title in 2015.^[3],[7],[8]

Carella works as a Food and Beverage consultant for hotels, restaurants and chefs including Mauro Colagreco, Himanshu Saini, Marco Ambrosino and Ana Roš.^[3]

For Mirazur, the three-Michelin-star restaurant in Menton led by Mauro Colagreco, he created a non-alcoholic pairing built around the theme of shiso. The dish 'Sanremo prawns, pear and fermented shiso' was matched with a drink of shiso and green apple cordial, banana water and hibiscus.^[9]

For Trèsind Studio in Dubai he created a pairing matching the dish 'Mushroom Noodles' with 'Green Karma', a drink made from Northern Indian apples, cucumber, toasted sesame oil and mezcal.^[9]

Carella, of the food and beverage consultancy Carico, co-founded the Milan pizzeria and cocktail bar Ultra with entrepreneur Fabrizio Margarita.^[10]

His mentor Salvatore Calabrese encouraged him to work abroad, which led to his collaboration with Giancarlo Mancino. In 2015 he took part in an event in Shanghai featuring chefs Umberto Bombana and Mauro Colagreco cooking together.