Conversation with a chef

Cru means raw in French and I’m always going to be drawn to anything French. I’m also drawn to the fact that Cru is very close to where I live and just one of those lovely neighbourhood wine bar treasures that serve excellent food and wine in a lovely setting. Whether you’re sitting out the front in the buzz of the café deli area or out the back in the courtyard, it’s just a really nice place to b...

Today’s chat is with Florian Ribul at Vex in Westgarth. I wrote about Vex for Broadsheet a few weeks ago and was keen to catch up with Flo again to hear more. He made me a coffee and we sat outside in the courtyard beneath the huge lemon tree. The way Flo talks about cooking and his life as a chef is captivating, and I could have easily listened for hours. But since opening a couple of months ago,...

Talking to Ryan Berry, head chef at Naughton’s Hotel in Parkville was a real highlight. Ryan is thoughtful and extremely articulate in the way he talks about cooking, teaching younger staff how to navigate chef life sustainably and with joy, and how important it is to work with ethical and passionate suppliers and producers. Naughton’s is one of those beautiful pubs where the décor makes you wish...

Michael Bacash | Bacash by Jo Rittey

Today’s chat is with Julian Summer at Pier St. over in Portarlington. Pier St is owned by Peter Roddy and his partner, Ebony Vagg and a couple of years ago, I had the absolute pleasure of speaking to Peter at their other venue, Noir in Richmond. Julian did part of his apprenticeship at Noir before heading to Perth and working at Wildflower, a fine dining restaurant specialising in native ingredien...

Some people dream of rooms lined with books, and I do love that idea too, but for me being surrounded by bottles of wine just feels right. So, sitting amongst the glowing bottles and talking to Kyle Nicol about his time in a Michelin star restaurant in London and his love of native ingredients, was absolute bliss. I have been into Rascal before to talk to Elliott Pinn who was head chef at the time...

When I first arrived in Melbourne nine years ago, I was introduced to a beautiful group of Mexican Irish friends, or more specifically, Mexican girls with Irish partners. My initial fascination with this particular combo quickly disappeared into the absolute joy I had spending time with them. Many in that group have moved on or away but I feel lucky that Greta and her Irish Dave remain amongst my...

Luigi Esposito grew up in Naples and from a very early age, learned the art of Neapolitan pizza when he worked with his nonna selling pizza fritta to locals. He went on to work in pizzerias around Naples and then the world before deciding to come to Sydney. In the 11 years he has been here, he has opened four successful pizza restaurants, earned the title of best Neapolitan style pizza in Sydney a...

Today’s chat is with Bree Gaudette and Matthew Ronalds from Hello Friend Foods, well, Bree and Matthew actually ARE Hello Friend Foods; a Melbourne company making delicious vegan cheese. Quite cinematically, the pair met when Bree took an Uber Matthew was driving, they got talking about the cheeses Bree had been experimenting with, Matthew thought it would make a great business and that was it; th...

Today’s chat is with Dougie Thompson. I reckon Dougie is the nicest guy in hospitality. He has been in the game for 15 years, working his way up from kitchen hand to head chef in a few venues around Melbourne before he and his wife went on a two year adventure around the world in search of street food. When he got back, “the country was on fire” and not long after, we were in lockdown. To keep him...

Elisa Hill comes from regional Sao Paolo in Brazil and has worked in kitchens of Paris and London, including two Michelin star restaurants, and she had her own restaurant in Sao Paulo before coming to Melbourne not long before we went into lockdown. Lockdown hasn’t stopped her; she has been cooking up a storm on Instagram, posting photos of beautiful dishes paired with glorious wines and sharing v...

Chris Orr is a Glaswegian chef with an infectious lust for life and passion for hospitality. Widely travelled and having worked in many different kitchens with a range of cuisines, Chris has lots of great stories and ever-evolving ideas for food. He now has his own kitchen, Wee Man’s Kitchen, which runs out of the Tallboy & Moose Brewery in Preston. It’s an open kitchen because Chris loves to chat...

I always love stories about chefs from other countries who have heard about Melbourne and are drawn to its reputation for diversity and excellence in food. I like it even more when they get here, love it, stay and become part of the Melbourne community. That’s what Michael Craig and his partner Shelley Scott did when they came from Glasgow eight years ago and not only has it been great for them, b...

Meni Valle is an Australian-Greek food educator, cookbook author and glorious cook. While she has always been an advocate for Mediterranean food and its benefits, her latest cookbook, Ikaria, not only extols the food, but also the way people are eating that food and living together. As the title might suggest, this book features the food of Ikaria, a Greek island which has been included amongst th...

Raph Rashid is the tonic Melbourne needs right now with his weekly instalments of favourite homecooked meals from his childhood in Raph’s Mean Cuisine on IGTV and YouTube. He cooks up a storm in his Brunswick home kitchen and every week invites a friend along for the ride. It’s uplifting and wholesome and you can’t help but smile the whole way through. But this isn’t the first time Raph has brough...

I’ve never actually met Iain Alexander in person. He reached out on Instagram just to say that he had been inspired by the chats on Conversation with a chef. At the time he was living in Melbourne and working for Scott Pickett, which is always going to go in someone’s favour, as far as I’m concerned. Then I looked at the photos of the food he was putting up on Instagram and I thought, this guy lov...

I had planned to speak to Matt Bentley in March. Then we went into lockdown. Over the isolation period, photos of the incredible food he was making at home would pop up on Instagram and his love for cooking and exploring new food ideas jumps out of the shots. I knew this already from all the great conversations I’ve had with chefs, but it really came home to me seeing photos like Matt’s that being...

I first spoke to Rotem Papo three years ago when he was head chef at L’Hotel Gitan. Since then he has been head chef at Bar Lourinha and now he is at Golda which he co-owns with Adam Faigen of Gramercy Social fame. As on the previous occasion, Rotem showed his absolute love of hospitality by offering me a glass of wine and a selection of the baktana, or small bites, which they had just put on the...

Charlie Cheng…great name…owns Shinbashi Yakiniku in Brisbane and in Melbourne. I went in to the Lygon Street venue back in November 2018 when the restaurant reopened and I wrote about it for Broadsheet. It had actually opened a year prior but due to damage from a fire in a neighbouring restaurant had to be closed and completely refitted. Yakiniku is a style of Japanese barbecue where guests cook o...

I spoke to Rob Kaboord for Broadsheet when Lekker first opened as a pop-up in the Windsor Hotel at the start of January. He was generous then with his time and the stories he shared with me and he was generous again this time. When we spoke in January, we had no idea that by now, mid-March, the world would be in such a state of flux. The hospitality industry has been particularly hard-hit, and the...

The word that stands out from my chat with Anthony Power of Pilgrim in Liverpool is fun. Anthony has been involved with a lot of projects and businesses and life adventures and he describes them all as fun. And I believe him. He exudes a palpable appreciation of life and the many opportunities he has been offered and has seized in both hands. He has worked in Canada, New Zealand, Mexico, London an...

Michael Harrison is a modest guy. I could already tell that by talking to him. He worked in excellent venues with top chefs right from the start and you don’t get to work your way up to head chef by the age of 26 without having something pretty stellar about you. Pretty Little owner, Michael Byard, is full of praise for his new head chef, and mentions the level of creativity that Michael brings to...

I have been thinking a lot about native food recently. But not as much as Jude Mayall, also known as the Outback Chef, thinks about native food. She is a passionate advocate for eating the food grown on the land we walk on and she has been supplying chefs, home cooks, distillers and manufacturers with a vast array of native ingredients since 2005. The dream was always to have her own place to shar...

Ideally I would have chatted to Daniele in Canggu once he is there in April and working as head chef at Squid Inc., but, you know, Richmond is fine. Really. But make a note of Squid Inc. for your next trip to Bali because you will be in excellent hands. Daniele Piras was born in Sardinia, but his family moved to a little town near Venice when he was 5 years old and he has many happy memories of ea...

Darren Robertson | Three Blue Ducks at The Farm, Byron Bay by Jo Rittey