Luke Eckersall

Born:

Melbourne

History:

I began my apprenticeship at Dish restaurant before following the head chef from Dish to open Taxi restaurant at Federation Square. After a year at Taxi I became the head chef of Transport and helped the team open Transit.

I took a year break from cooking and decided to be a lolly maker at Suga for that year before moving briefly to 312 Carlton. I took a sous chef position at Ladro Gertrude and stayed there for over a year before moving overseas. I came back to Melbourne to open Ladro Greville as head chef before moving to Ciccolina to help out a friend of mine that was the Sous chef. My last position before starting Stone Hotel (2015) was as head chef at The Farm Cafe.

Have you always wanted to be a chef?

Yes, I have always enjoyed making people happy - doing this with food seemed easy for me.

Style?

Simple, but pretty dishes cooked with lots of fat.

Feature flavour?

Not sure - but loving lemons at the moment .

Obsessive compulsive about?

Clean sinks and wearing two pairs of socks when I work.

Inspirations/influences?

My Nan – I remember making biscuits together when I was six.

What do you love about this business?

That anyone can achieve anything with hard work and persistence.

Ingredients can’t live without?

Fat (any), Pasta (any),tomatoes and lemon.

Eyebrow raising dish / Signature dish:

Bacon doughnuts with whipped bay leaf butter.