Dirty Linen - A Food Podcast with Dani Valent

Pig and cattle farmer Jono Hurst takes a break from ‘hamageddon’ to talk about the big issue facing many small farmers: lack of access to abattoirs. Why has it become so hard for meat producers to have their animals killed locally and traceably? Why does it matter? We also chat about Jono’s recent kidney donation to his wife Nat. https://www.brooklandsfarms.com.au/ Links: Sign the petition to enab...

As we prepare to close the door on 2024, it’s a fine time to look back on the year that was and head into 2025 with clear intentions. Marco Finanzio runs Umberto Group, a small collection of mostly Italian businesses in Melbourne’s Thornbury. It’s been a year of financial fine-tuning but what is Marco planning for his team and his business in the year to come? https://www.umbertogroup.com.au/ SUBS...

Friday On My Mind! What’s on my mind this Friday? In this occasional series, I share what I’ve been up to and what is keeping my mind busy. I talk about recent travels in Hong Kong, China, New Zealand and Japan, invite you to eat food with me in Clayton, and air some concerns about the issues besetting small farmers.  Join me on my Food Discovery Tour: https://www.trybooking.com/events/landing/132...

Dirty Linen takes a trip to New Zealand, including a few days in Dunedin. Restaurateur and chef Jack Bradbury grew up in the small southern city before skilling up in tough kitchens in the UK. Back home, he's running the hospitality offering at Ebb-Dunedin, the swankiest hotel in town. https://www.instagram.com/ebb.kitchen/ SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER FOR EXCLUSIVE ARTICLES, NEWS, GIVEAWAYS AND BE...

This special series follows the progress of chef Simone Watts’ 40-seat farm-to-table restaurant at Cape Schanck on the Mornington Peninsula. As a February opening draws closer, we hear what’s been happening and what’s coming up. Simone outlines the development of a model of land and kitchen sharing that encourages small producers, and we talk about the crucial benefits for chefs and diners when co...

It’s been a big few weeks for Caitlin Baker. The restaurant manager at Canberra’s Such and Such was named Sommelier of the Year by the Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide. In a year in which workplace culture has been a huge part of the conversation, she was also acknowledged for founding Venus Vinifera. Launched in 2021, this education and support community for women, non-binary and those with...

There aren’t many truly seasonal products but cherries are one of those fruits that only appear as the weather warms up. By January they are more or less gone again. For me, they are more exciting than Christmas. Andrew Fairley is a lawyer and cherry farmer. Yarra Valley Cherries is home to 20,000 trees that provide up to 200 tonnes of cherries every year. This will be Andrew’s 10th harvest on thi...

New York is one of those cities I feel I’m always planning my eating in. I’m often reading about restaurants there, trying to keep up with neighbourhood news and editing my personal list of must eats and need to tries. Top of that list right now is Acru, which is co-owned by Daniel Garwood, a chef from Tassie. The next best thing to making a booking is chatting to the man himself. We talk ambition...

Ever since I ate an egg made of coconut, sweet potato and agar agar I knew I’d have to talk to Mark Filippelli about it one day. The co-founder of 18 restaurants including Melbourne’s Matcha Mylkbar in viral vegan 2016 has just released a plant-forward book called This Cookbook Is A Huge Missed Steak. We talk identity, letting go and ambition. https://ahugemissedsteak.com/products/this-cookbook-is...

Irish Korean chef KyongHo ‘Daniel’ Choi is the winner of the San Pellegrino Young Chef Academy Pacific finals, and will be travelling to Milan next year to represent the region at the global finale. The ultimate victory is the title of the world’s best chef under 30, but what is Daniel learning along the way? https://www.sanpellegrinoyoungchefacademy.com/ SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER FOR EXCLUSIVE...

Mary Vaughan is the Senior Station Manager of Anthony Lagoon, part of the Westholme Wagyu supply chain for cattle company AACo. Known to all as Brumby, she spent her early years on the land and was always drawn to horses and station life. Brumby’s workplace is about 400km north east of Tennant Creek on a historic stock route in the Northern Territory’s Barkly Tablelands. Their role is to breed the...

After losing her business during Covid, Genevieve Muir spent more time in the kitchen cooking the food of her West African heritage. Keen to master a prized condiment, she spent months tweaking the recipe until her extended family approved. And now, Coast of Gold Shitto is on shelves across the country. https://coastofgold.com.au/ SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER FOR EXCLUSIVE ARTICLES, NEWS, GIVEAWAYS...

Dirty Linen hops on a plane to Hong Kong, on a mission to find the best food and drink. We meet local food journalist Janice Leung Hayes at old-school cha chaan teng For Kee. After pork chop on rice and milk tea, we take a walk around Sheung Wan's dried seafood stalls. https://www.instagram.com/e_ting/?hl=en Dirty Linen travelled to Hong Kong courtesy of Lee Kum Kee. SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER FO...

It must be a difficult time to own a bar group, with conversations about toxic workplace culture swirling around and tough questions being asked about gendered violence. We chat to Jeremy Blackmore, co-owner of Mucho Group in Sydney. Mucho’s Cantina OK has just been listed at #96 on the World’s 50 Best Bars list - we chat success, growth, creativity, change and agave. https://www.muchogroup.com.au...

Dirty Linen is 700! For our milestone episode we’re launching Journey to Barragunda, a special series that follows the progress of chef Simone Watts' 40-seat farm-to-table restaurant on the Mornington Peninsula. Four months from opening, we learn the story to date and dive into the long list of things still to do. A few Episode 700 thank yous. Firstly, to Deep in the Weeds’ Anthony Huckstep and Ro...

We’re heading to the rangelands of northern Australia today. Joel Murray is the station manager at Wylarah, a key cattle station for Westholme Wagyu. Wylarah is about 500 km west of Brisbane, in river country with rolling hills, and runs up to 10,000 cattle at a time. The rhythm of the year is set by the seasons but life on Wylarah is as bound up in technology as it is in nature: it’s a modern app...

The Australian hospitality industry creates over 1.2 million tonnes of food waste every year or 16% of Australia’s food waste. Reducing that is of direct economic benefit to businesses: for every dollar spent to reduce food waste, $9.50 is returned to the bottom line. Sarah Hughes is a Sydney pastry chef and baker who is now part of End Food Waste Australia, a non-profit body working towards an Au...

Generation Next! We love supporting the next generation of talent in the food world. Today’s guest is butcher Matt Tyquin from Ashburton Meats in Melbourne. An alumni of William Angliss Institute, Matt was Victoria’s Apprentice of the Year and won the World Champion Butcher Apprentice in the USA. We talk choice cuts and career satisfaction. Keep an eye out for his nacho sausage! https://www.ashbur...

There are so many ways to build a career in hospitality. Sven Ullrich is executive chef at Hyatt Regency Sydney and is overseeing a sustainable seafood concept at the hotel’s Sailmaker restaurant, which he hopes will straddle the divide between city destination and hotel guest hangout. We talk about the different pathways between hotel dining and restaurant cheffing: are some people particularly s...

How much do you know about Sudanese food? Are you ready for the African version of Guzman y Gomez? Musa Algeed runs The Pharoah BBQ, a Sydney food truck with a mission to introduce Australia - and the world - to the flavours of Khartoum. This is an inspiring conversation full of energy and a belief in the journey. https://www.instagram.com/thepharaohbbq/?hl=en SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER FOR EXCLU...

As we round the bend towards 700 episodes, we check in with Dirty Linen’s most frequent return guest Martin Boetz, owner and chef of Shortgrain. We followed the creation story of his Brisbane restaurant, which has just celebrated a year of trading, enduring ups, downs and staffing challenges. It’s a good time to reflect on the journey, but Marty is a long way from Queensland today… https://www.sho...

International workers and students are often presented as statistics but they are, of course, real people having real lives, and often their uncertain status and lack of local knowledge means they work in conditions that Australians wouldn’t put up with. Today’s guest is Dee Yürür, a Turkish chef on a graduate visa that is fast running out. As Dee grapples with the notion of having to leave Austra...

Who loves shouting at their dining companions in noisy restaurants? South Australian audiologist and occupational noise assessor Laura Drexler has created the Ambient Menu, a guide to quiet restaurants. With one in six Australians having an issue with their hearing, knowing which restaurants are relatively quiet can be the difference between feeling part of the gang or being socially isolated. Hav...

Welcome to the final episode in our miniseries collaboration between Producers podcast and AgriCULTURED, a festival which showcases and connects the produce and people of northern Tasmania, or Lutruwita as it’s called in Aboriginal culture. So far, we’ve heard from duck farmer Bec Rumble, vegetable grower Wouter Sels, winemaker Linda Morice and finally we’re chatting to Annette Reed from Tasmanian...

I first remember listening to Virginia Trioli on ABC Radio Melbourne when it was still called 774 and she was doing afternoons. It’s one of the earliest times I remember really listening to radio that wasn’t a football broadcast, engaging with that idea of live storytelling, carrying a city through its celebrations and its sadnesses, and asking questions that were sometimes cosy and sometimes very...