Born: Bundaberg
History: Raised
in the sunny town of Bundaberg,
I was interested in anything I could get my hands into – thanks to my loving
parents, Paul & Julie, for their patience. Nothing stopped them from
forging a determined young man, stuffed full of dreams coated in the determination.
So it was that I set about trying to make as many of them happen as was
possible.
I didn't start straight into my apprenticeship,
finishing secondary school on a high note, and there were options out there far
more attractive to a driven young man than the $4.15 an hour that was the going
rate at the time for a first year apprentice. So it was I found myself managing
cinemas, working the projection rooms, and immersing myself in pop culture,
advertising and the plotting of public trends. I had many sideline projects
occurring to satisfy the rest of my developing thirst for a broad base of
general knowledge, projects including support teaching in local primary and
high schools, training and developing young minds and bodies in the local Scout
group and developing a personal portfolio of artworks and techniques.
So it was that I felt I had learnt all that I could
in Bundaberg for that time, and set out with my sights on the big cities. After
a short stint in Melbourne, setting up a new
cinema, I found myself calling Brisbane
home. There the supportive, honest and almost family like team at Birch Carrol
and Coyle, Garden City made me realise that my now infamous dinner parties were
a sign of a far greater creativity that had been developing below the surface,
and so it was I set out to begin my apprenticeship, as a chef.
It was the awakening I had been waiting for. I
found that all of the previous knowledge and almost trivially useless bits of
information I had accumulated over the years could be turned towards my
cooking. Upon reaching my second year in my apprenticeship, I came to work
under Chef Michael Ryan, at the Mercure and Ibis Hotels in Brisbane. There he recognised my creativity
and determination to find something bigger and better, and he made me work to
develop it. I was afforded privileges well above my station, and with the
experiences I had gained from starting my apprenticeship later than most, I
paid those privileges back by taking responsibilities on beyond my pay grade.
My desire to achieve and learn, made me determined
to complete my apprenticeship in at least a third restaurant, which brought me
to working the seafood station at Kingsley Steak and Crab House on Eagle Street. There
I met Chef Leon Walker, a chef who had a similar desire to do new food using
the most proper and archaic techniques. I stepped straight from my apprenticeship into
the hectic role of Head Chef at one of Brisbane's
busiest outlying hotels, the Everton Park Hotel.
From the Everton
Park, I returned to
working for Chef Michael Ryan, who had at the time become the regional catering
manager for Blue Care Nursing. Ironically it was there, cooking for a range of
hostel and nursing home guests, that I started becoming the Chef I am today. I
was turning out food under strict guidelines and budget constraints that I
would never have thought possible. To this day I am still thankful for what the
girls at Blue Care taught me, and helped me do, and a little bit extra gracious
to Catty for the most amazing doughnut recipe I have ever found.
I then returned to Bundaberg, to spend some time
with my family, and began trialling this new way of working creatively with my
foods. There, at Hakuna Matata, right on the beautiful coral coast beaches, I
began teasing and working with the dining public, developing two of my
signature dishes, the Chicken Saltimbucco and Slow Roasted Lamb with Savoury Chocolate
Jus.
Then moving from one beautiful coastline to another
I worked my way towards Coffs Harbour, after a short stint at Blue Smoke BBQ in Brisbane, working with
the energetic Chef Daniel Dyson, developing hot smoking skills. Coffs Harbour
is where the story leads to and is the beginning of a new peak. It was here I
ran into Semret Goitom, Managing Director of Best Western Zebra Motel, a family
owned business and home of the Zulu's Restaurant & Bar.
At Zulu's Restaurant & Bar they had a modest
menu featuring some very traditional Australian favourites, suited to their
regular business clientele. Being inspired by a visit from Semret's own mother,
and Ethiopian cook, who introduced me to the most exotic and yet familiar
flavours, we began working on turning Zulu's into a restaurant of it's own
right and name, not just a service to the motel. So it was our unique African
inspired, Modern Australian menu was developed, trialled and reworked, into the
marvel it is today. A symphony of flavour inspired by the African continent,
balanced in the way of the Thai cuisine and worked and served with the fresh
intent of the best Italian dishes, it has become a cuisine of its own right,
uniquely developed for the Australian palate, and found nowhere else.
This new cuisine came with a new look, and some
branding, logos and websites - I used my talents developed before my apprenticeship
to create these - and now we are finding ourselves to be of new interest to the
dining public.
Have you always wanted to be a Chef?
On reflection, it was the only choice for me. I
don't think I could truly be happy without a menu to play with, dishes to
tease, and guests to stun and or shock.
How would you define your style?
I would define my style as twisted. I enjoy
watching peoples faces as they realise that the food they recognise, and are
happily devouring, isn't anything they truly expected, and has been put before
them with more love and passion then they could have expected.
What is your feature flavour these days?
At the moment, I would say I am in my chilli phase;
chilli is an essential ingredient in African, and so many other cuisines. To
add excitement to the issue, the vanilloid receptors in your mouth, the ones
that register the chilli 'burn' are also hard wired to the area of your brain right
next to your pleasure centre. At the moment I love playing with this anomaly
and using chilli as a conduit to create new found joy in food.
Obsessive compulsive about?
I am obsessive compulsive about trying to please
every guest, to my detriment; sometimes I am closely watching what comes back
on plates. I figure If you don't know how the story of your food played out for
the guest, how are you going to perfect your culinary tales?
Your greatest culinary inspirations?
Heston. That man is god, and has created something
to which no one else can truly copy - that is what inspires me. I don't try to
replicate or out do him, I wouldn't begin to assume I have his base of
knowledge, or resources, but to just think solidly about what it is you are
doing to your food, and what the outcome of your manipulations are, to control
the experience of the dish itself. Then to put a stamp of humour and excitement
into the dish as well, because that is what people dine out for, an ape can
cook, as can most people to survive, but people go out to experience something
they couldn't get elsewhere.
What do you love about this business?
Taking something that everyone has access to and
doing something with it that they couldn't do themselves. It's so exciting, and
satisfies that ego we all have to show we have something unique within us. I
get to do it with every dish, every day, how could you not be in love with
that?
An ingredient you can’t live without?
Passion. Nothing tastes better than a dish basted
in passion, wrapped in passion and served with a side sauce of passion,
nothing… Unless it is garnished with a sense of humour.
Most “eyebrow raising” menu item?
There was a huge argument on site when I wanted to
put this on the menu, and after a very long debate, and the promise not to
advertise its existence until it had been trialled subtly with our guests, it
made it onto the menu, and it has proven to be our most ordered, and successful
dessert for nine months now. That dish is our Toffee Coated Crickets, a.k.a
Cricket Snaps and now affectionately known as ‘toffee with legs’. And YES they
are honest to god insects (a sustainable, viable, environmentally sound super
food).