Dietmar Sawyere

For many years Dietmar Sawyere worked as a chef in hotels and understands very well what it means to try and appeal to all tastes. Now in his own restaurants in Sydney and Auckland, he believes that the more specific your market is, the better.

In talking from the dizzy heights of Forty One, Chifley Towers, Sydney, he explains -

" When we opened up here, we were appealing to maybe the top 5% of incomes in Sydney, well that's fine as long as we got them all. But at whatever 'level' you are aiming for, you have to "be congruent with that." The word congruency keeps on coming up in his conversation. For Dietmar it is very important that everything fits together,

"It's fine to have the right concept, but then you have to be congruent with it, Its one thing to want to do a fine dining restaurant, but if you don't have the money or the skills or whatever else, its not going to work because the whole thing is not going to come together."

There was a time, he believes, when people "would put up with indifferent service and lousy locations, if the food was good enough" but now "it's the whole theatre of dining which we put in a lot of effort to create."

The 'theatre' of Forty One is made up of an extraordinary view, of a large team of waiters, of heaps of space between tables, of the sense of wealth and power generated by the customers themselves, of the plushness of the carpet, furnishings and table settings and, all of this set off by the friendly familarity to their enormously regular clientele of Wendy, Dietmar's wife, out front.

" I'd like to think it was purely the food being a chef at heart, but when you own the restaurant as well, you change. As Executive Chef in a hotel you have the Food and Beverage Manager looking after all that kind of stuff, and you only have to worry about the kitchen. When you have your own place, you then have to start thinking about everything else"

"When we started off, there were a lot of things we wanted to do but couldn't afford. It was a big investment, but a lot of it has grown. People look at it, and see Riedel glasses throughout, but we couldn't afford those at the beginning".

Dietmar explained how his partners are the building owners. "It was the only way we could do it. For them it was the best thing they ever did. We were their first tenants, and this building has been full ever since. A lot of it was to do with us, because a lot of people knew where this building was because of the restaurant. Even though we get very few actual diners out of the building, because it's only really the top people that are going to come up here.

Despite, or perhaps because of this exclusivity, Dietmar sees Forty One, as a "very Sydney restaurant, it is such a fickle market here, but we've targeted the managing directors, the CEO's, those "with money and power". "Forty One is not about show and glitz, the tables are set far apart, there are private rooms. He feels that it is very understated. " If people want to be seen, this isn't the place to come. Because if you are sitting upstairs and people don't see, the whole point is lost."

But for those lesser mortals who do need to impress, there is no place more impressive for lunching an important client. With its amazing birds eye views of all of Sydney visible from the dining room and from the toilets, there is no missing the fact that this is a priveliged spot to dine in.

It's a privelige which many in the industry resent. The floor was originally earmarked for Alan Bond and then for an exclusive Japanese club. The plush set up was a great start for Dietmar and Wendy Sawyere six years ago.

It took the couple four years of "never leaving the place and doing everything ourselves" before they could think of other things. In 1999 Dietmar was able to fulfill a dream of taking over, in Auckland, the site of the first restaurant that he worked at when he left Europe. "Built in 1910, its an historic building, with lots of little rooms, and fireplace, very different to this (Forty One) in feel, but with a lot of dishes on that menu that I would not dream of putting on here. Its been a restaurant for about 20 years, in the early eighties it was probably the top restaurant in new Zealand" Here at Five City Road he has chef Crosby Mar in charge who has been working with him for some nine years. Dietmar has developed a lot of good staff over the years and so is able to move between the two businesses.

"But there was no point in doing anything else in Sydney. I looked around at my peers and no one has been successful, operating more than one restaurant in the same market place. I don't see the point of dividing your market. We've got one at this level, we sit 140 here, we have a waiting list each evening, why do something else. It's big enough to fill."

Dietmar estimates that Forty One has a minimum of 80% return guests, "it's often in the 90's. We could have gone for the more touristy market, but it's better to have a huge return clientele and consistency.." A lot of time is dedicated to finding out what their regulars like to eat and drink. There are two girls on the phone full time checking and a " fairly stable staff on the floor."

And, aside from what clients want, the major influence on his food is - "life I suppose. There is no real one thing, or certain country. My biggest single influence is obviously ingredients. It depends what the produce is as to how we use it."

Dietmar tends to combine Asian flavours with fish and not with meat because he feels it suits it better. Also with game, which he uses a lot, he will be "fairly European" because it suits it better. He aims for a balanced menu in terms of ingredients - meat, fish and vegetables, but not in styles. For him, it is - what ever technique suits. "I've never been a big fan of the East West style of cooking where you take a rack of lamb and sit it on stir fried noodles and call that east west. To me that's just clashing, it doesn't work."

One of his most popular dishes is Prawns In Waistcoats

"I've been doing that for years in one way or another. It started in Thailand as a nice way to present prawns and to have potatoes with them. Basically it's a version of curry prawns, with a twist -with beautiful big fresh Yamba prawns, a thin layer of crisp potato around it, a very lightly spiced Indian sauce blended with a little bit of Hollondaise at the end. People love curry prawns, and being a large restaurant that we want to fill everyday, we have to put some commercial reality into it as well. There's a lot of dishes that if it were a 60 seat restaurant that I would do that I don't do here"

The Sawyeres have a big business at Forty One with growing revenue and large staff. In the kitchen there are now 18, "when we opened we had 9 and on the floor, usually 15 on for service as the restaurant is so spread out."

Amazing when you consider that the young hotel chef who has lived and worked in seven countries, had never intended to come to Australia. He had been fascinated by Asia but after a stint in Melbourne as Executive Chef of the Regent which he really enjoyed, he's now been here twelve years.

A review of Forty One

Dietmar Sawyere's Recipes

Prawns in potato waistcoats with a sauce of Indian spices
Warm salad of chinese roast duck & sea scallops with watrcress and a vietnamese dressing
Roast loin of venison with an oriental mushroom pie & a madeira jus