Dirty Linen - A Food Podcast with Dani Valent

UK-born chef Aidan Robinson's pandemic began on Valentine's Day when his restaurant Dinner by Heston served its last meal. Since then, Aidan has fruitlessly sought to be paid his outstanding entitlements, unsuccessfully looked for a new job as a sponsored visa holder, set up a home-based cake business Chic de Partie and applied for a partner visa, which came through last week. It's been a rollerco...

Chantal de Fraga owns three Richmond pubs, Kingston Hotel, Swan Hotel and Public House. We focus on staffing in this episode, an instant crisis as Melbourne restaurants reopen with a much smaller pool of potential employees to draw on. Many internationals have departed, erstwhile hospo staff have taken employment in other industries and some are content to sit on JobSeeker for now. As Melbourne he...

Sean Kierce owns Ladro pizza restaurants in Fitzroy and Prahran. He didn't know it till we started chatting but numerous diners have been in touch with Dirty Linen to compliment Ladro's COVID-safe protocols. We chat rules and staying safe, pandemic perspective, and why it's important to play the long game as Melbourne gears back up. https://ladro.com.au Follow Dirty Linen on Instagram https://www....

As Victoria and New South Wales decide to open their border, we head to Albury-Wodonga to chat to Jacob Wolki. Jake is a farmer who's about to open a butchery. He also owns Cycle Station bike shop and cafe. We talk food systems, community, connection, transparency, why he appreciates the pandemic, and local, local, local. https://www.wolkifarm.com.au Read this book: The Shepherd's Life by James Re...

Is it crazy or brave to open a restaurant during a pandemic? Let's ask Pierre Geoffroy, who launched Abbiocco in bayside Highett in June. But before we talk about that, Pierre has to endure my bad French accent, followed by a long minute of Dirty Linen on the couch spilling some feels. And finally, we get to it: hospo families, whether fine dining has a future, the ins and outs of reopening to ove...

Today on Dirty Linen, we talk with Suzy Pavlov from Moonee Ponds' Lebanese restaurant Bekka. Melbourne is a few days into reopening and it's a juggle of joy (welcoming customers back, facilitating happy reunions, putting food on plates again) and pain (easing laggardly diners out the door, getting heartily sick of masks, wondering why owning a business doesn't pay these days). The pandemic has cau...

Hugo Tremayne owns Fitzroy bar Little Hop. We chat mid-way through their first weekend back open - busy, positive, crazy! Our chat is a bit of an ode to the spirit of Melbourne hospitality and a recognition of the profound importance restaurants, cafes and bars can have in the lives of their customers and workers. Hospitality is so much more than dispensing food and drink, it's weaving meaning thr...

Today we speak to restaurateur and salted egg obsessive Dion Sanusi, owner of Yoi in the Melbourne CBD. Yoi opened on Day One of Melbourne's emergence from lockdown and Dion talks about the joys and challenges of welcoming back diners. We also chat about the CBD - is a city restaurant viable without as many international students and office workers? And why isn't Indonesian food ubiquitous here? I...

With Melbourne reopening, we thought it was timely to check in with epidemiologist Mary-Louise McLaws to look at the new landscape with a dining skew. Why is it necessary to reopen slowly? Why would a 500 sq m restaurant have the same number limits as a 100 sq m place? How to approach cleaning (antimicrobial fogging or nah?), toileting, and mask on-and-offing. Dine safe, everyone! https://research...

Melbourne is open! Coskun Uysal is gearing up to open his modern Turkish restaurant Tulum in a couple of days. He opens up about how negative and self-critical he felt during lockdown, and takes us back to his childhood in Istanbul, where the anguish of being gay and the silence he lived with was a crushing feature of life in his tiny family home. For Coskun, Melbourne is a place of love, welcome...

As Melbourne prepares to reopen, I thought it would be great to get some intel from a caterer who specialises in dealing with the unexpected - bad weather, grumpiness, collapsed marquees... Sophie Storen from Cookes Food shares tips on attitude, personnel, sheeting rain, mozzies, extreme heat and more. We also talk about one of the banes of the pandemic - takeaway containers! https://www.cookesfoo...

Unstoppable Melbourne restaurateur Jessi Singh opened Mr Brownie in winter, adding it to a roster of restaurants that includes Daughter-in-Law, Mrs Singh, Dhaba at the Mill in Kyneton and Sydney's Don't Tell Aunty. He talks about growing up in Punjab and how the life and lessons of India have set him up for success in Australia, even during a pandemic. https://www.themrbrownie.com Follow Dirty Lin...

Alba Badrena Alcover is a Spanish waiter who had about five jobs in March then lost them all when COVID hit. She's bounced around during the pandemic, eating into her super, doing a medical trial for money, taking a free room from a kindly publican and now working at Great Ocean Ducks in Western Victoria. It's been a crazy 2020 for this lovely, lively temporary visa holder. Follow Dirty Linen on I...

Normally at this time of year, event maestro Bruce Keebaugh would be putting final touches to his Bird Cage marquees and canapes, the hottest ticket at Melbourne's Spring Racing Carnival. 2020? Not so much. Instead, he's created an outdoor restaurant and bar called The Commons, while still advocating and planning for the return of large events. The mood? Hope and joy, always hope and joy. https://...

Jayne Newgreen has so much going on! With her partner Christopher Howe, she runs Talbot Provedore & Eatery, a country store/cafe/restaurant with a strong local focus. She's one of the founders of Provenir, a mobile on-farm abattoir, which just won the Outstanding Innovation, Sustainability & Community gong in the Delicious Produce awards. We talk about steering staff and customers through tumult a...

Victor Aghtan owns Tim Ho Wan and Hawker Chan, city restaurants with branches in Box Hill and Chadstone. We talk about the difficulties of reopening, particularly in the city, and especially when the restaurants' customers and staff used to be international students, many of whom have left Australia during the pandemic. Oh, and we have a big fight about Hainanese chicken rice! Follow Dirty Linen o...

Dirty Linen chats to Manpreet Singh from Richmond's Ladyboy Dining in the wake of Victorian Premier Dan Andrew's easing of restrictions - including the limited opening of Melbourne restaurants from November 2. The next step doesn't go far enough for everyone but Manpreet is feeling positive and getting ready to welcome back diners. https://ladyboydining.com.au Follow Dirty Linen on Instagram https...

Paul Kasteel owns Hoo Haa bar in Windsor. It's upstairs on Chapel Street and has a drinking and DJ focus so sedate outdoor dining is far from a straightforward proposition. It's costing Paul $2000 a week to open for takeaway right now so he's understandably desperate to open safely. While he's waiting for clarity, there are a million things to think about and be overwhelmed about each day. https:/...

There are lots of people who are ancillary to the hospitality industry - people like food writers (hello!) and photographers - hello, Kristoffer Paulsen. We talk about image-making in general, and focus on three key pics from Kris's portfolio: George Calombaris (pre-pandemic, mid-scandal), Victorian Premier Dan Andrews (pre-hotel quarantine) and Attica chef Ben Shewry (between lockdowns). https://...

Rabih Yanni owns Botanical Hotel in South Yarra, an iconic pub that looks after a huge, invested community. Rabih is finding solidarity with other prominent restaurateurs through the pandemic and hopes that progress towards common goals will continue to knit the hospitality industry together on the other side of lockdown. Meantime, he's feeling the tough times and looking forward to better times:...

Renowned Melbourne chef Philippa Sibley reckons this year has been one of the best, as well as one of the worst. She's appreciated the creativity of those around her and the opportunity to try new things herself. At the moment, she's excited about Take3byPS, her new mystery dinner delivery service. She's also feeling optimistic about a good summer in her job at city mainstay The European. Also thi...

Mary-Louise McLaws is a Professor of Epidemiology, Hospital Infection and Infection Diseases Control at the University of NSW and a Member of the World Health Organisation ad hoc Infection Prevention and Control for COVID-19. We talk restaurants indoors and outdoors, and she tells us how business owners can improve safety for diners and staff. Follow Dirty Linen on Instagram https://www.instagram....

Today on Dirty Linen we chat to Omnia chef Steve Nairn about how sad it is to skip asparagus season and how difficult it is to plan reopening when you have no idea what the rules will be. We also dip into Steve's impressive CV to learn about grouse-plucking in Scotland and alphabetised everything at Eleven Madison Park. Fine dining is dead! Long live fine dining! https://www.omniabistro.com.au Fol...

Dan Sims' pandemic started with a cancelled cheese festival and 1.5 tonnes of cheese to move, and continued with some big questions about the place of mass gatherings in a COVID-normal world. How on earth might you do a wine festival without spittoons, for example? Dan is a hospo guy from way back but he's just as concerned about the place of the arts in a vibrant Australia - is there a way for cr...

Christo Christophidis owns Ripponlea Food & Wine in inner-city Ripponlea and Mocha Jo's in outer-suburban Glen Waverley. As president of the Glen Waverley trader's association, he's been pandemicking since January when the area's Chinese community weathered early COVID impacts. We talk about finding the fire and remembering why you lit it in the first place, getting the bricks out of the boot of y...