Abrió un restaurante de alta cocina y nadie iba

Is it possible to build a fine dining restaurant in the middle of the Atacama Desert? In this interview, I spoke with Sergio Armella, founder and chef of Ephedra, a restaurant located in San Pedro de Atacama with a breathtaking view of the Licancabur volcano and a culinary offering based almost exclusively on local desert ingredients. Sergio's story is far from conventional. He studied law due to social and family pressure, but dropped out during a difficult period in his life and decided to pursue cooking, a decision that many around him questioned. Years later, he completed internships at some of the world's most prestigious restaurants, including Geranium in Denmark and Boragó in Chile, before returning to San Pedro de Atacama to open his own restaurant. In this conversation, we talked about: ✅ His childhood helping out in his mother's store ✅ His first business venture as a child ✅ Why he dropped out of law school ✅ His family's reaction when he decided to study cooking ✅ His experience in world-class restaurants ✅ How he got his first reservations ✅ The mistakes he made when opening his restaurant ✅ How profitable is fine dining really? ✅ The gastronomy of the Atacama Desert ✅ Sourcing local ingredients ✅ Entrepreneurship, leadership, and decision-making Sergio also shares the lessons he learned building a project from scratch in one of Chile's most important tourist destinations. I especially thank the Hotel Cumbres San Pedro de Atacama for their support and hospitality during this visit. Follow me on Instagram:   / francois.pouzet     / emprendedor.chile