Angelo Georgalli

Georgalli first met his wife when he was 25. The two dated for quite some time, and travelled together to Egypt, Mexico and Thailand before finally settling in Auckland. The couple have been blessed with three children.

In 2014, Georgalli shifted to Wanaka on New Zealand’s South Island. The place inspired him for getting back to basics and promoting the same through his television show.

Angelo Georgalli was born as Arcangelo Georgalli in Glasglow to a chef father and a homemaker mother. He had mixed heritage, his father being a Greek-Cypriot, while his mother an Italian by birth. He was the youngest of the three brothers and the most loved and pampered one.

Soon after his birth, the family moved to Cyprus. There, the Georgallis’ followed a Mediterranean lifestyle at a coastal farm. The blissful living however, was ruined with the Turkey’s invasion of Cyprus.

After living in the British army camp for about six months, Georgallis’ realized that they could never regain their possessions. They moved to Italy briefly before finally settling down in London.

With all assets gone and no money in hand, Gerogallis’ initially lived a life of meagre means in London. They stayed in a three-bedroom council house in Tottenham. However, despite the challenging times, his father, who believed in fresh produce, turned the big back garden into a farm. While in one section he bred animals, in the other, he grew vegetables. This laid the foundation for young Georgalli’s future life course. As a young boy, he spent a lot of time in the kitchen.

Angelo Georgalli is dyslexic and withdrew himself from school at the age of 14. Having imbibed the culinary skills from his parents, Georgalli started working for his cousin’s Greek delicatessen. The experience was life-changing as it gave Georgalli the necessary foundation for cooking good food. It augmented his basic knowledge about the different spices and herbs, grains, cheese.

Life changed for Angelo Georgalli when he met his future wife, a New Zealander. Having spent some time in various parts of the world, the couple finally settled in Auckland where Georgalli opened his first cafe.

Georgalli’s inaugural cafe was a big hit with the New Zealanders and led him to open seven more outlets – cafes, delicatessen and restaurants across Auckland. The family temporarily moved to Italy for a year to live in a rambling 16th-century house in Tuscany, where Georgalli rekindled his childhood activity of growing and farming fresh produce for daily food.

Upon returning to Auckland, Georgalli realized that he wasn’t meant to be confined to the constraints of city life. Consequently, the family moved to the Wanaka region in New Zealand’s South Island. There, he took up work as a chef but later left it to start up his archery school, a sport he was passionate about.

Life turned around for a second time for Georgalli when he was offered a cooking television show. A television producer for whom he guest starred once, was impressed by his talent and wanted Georgalli to start his own show.

Not the one to follow routine, Georgalli pitched in his own style and offered the concept of foraging, hunting, fishing and cooking foods found in the wild. Finding it absolutely new and an untouched genre in cookery shows, the producer readily agreed thus forming the globally popular show, ‘The Game Chef’.