Helena Rizzo was born in 1978, she is a Brazilian chef and restaurateuse. She runs the restaurant Maní, in São Paulo. Rizzo was elected Best Female Chef of the Year by Restaurant Magazine in 2014. Born in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Rizzo studied Architecture at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul. She left the college and began working as a model. Her friend, model Fernanda Lima invited her to move to São Paulo. She quit modeling and became a cook in 1997, working at the restaurant Roanne, with Claude Troisgros and Emmanuel Bassoleil. She did internships in Europe at the restaurants Sadler, in Italy and El Celler de Can Roca, in Spain. In 2006, when she returned to Brazil, Rizzo, her husband Daniel Redondo, and associates, among them Fernanda Lima, opened the restaurant Maní. In 2014 Maní was elected the 36th best restaurant in the world by Restaurant magazine, and second best in South America, behind D.O.M. In 2015, it was awarded a Michelin star. In 2018, Rizzo appeared as a judge on the "Brazil" episode of The Final Table, season 1. In 2019 Food & Wine named Mani to their list of the 30 best restaurants in the world. Maní’s menu makes sense, considering Rizzo’s background. The restaurant blends Brazilian and European cuisines, which produces dishes such as foie gras “bonbons” with guava paste, and banana with manioc flour and edamame. In 2009, chef, author, and critic Anissa Helou described Rizzo’s cooking as “delightful and clever.” The Michelin inspectors advise diners to “allow your senses to run free as you savor modern dishes with superb textures and clearly defined flavors, which are created using the finest Brazilian ingredients.” “In the beginning Maní was much more commercial, in the sense that we couldn’t take as many risks,” Rizzo told Eater a few years ago. “The restaurant worked, tables were full, and that gave us the freedom to evolve, to push further, and to do things our way.“ “I am not, nor have I ever claimed to be ‘the best female chef in the world,'”

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