Karen Martini

Melbourne Wine Room chef, Karen Martini's entry into cooking was not too encouraging. She did work experience at Mietta's and saw first hand the effects of a chef's temper. She was 15 at the time, dropped into a very male dominated kitchen. "I think Jacques Reymond actually threw something at one of the waiters whilst I was there. It was really messy. That was the first time I had stepped into a kitchen." But she would not be put off and kept trying for an apprenticeship until the Austin Hospital took the determined 15-year-old on.

actually threw something at one of the waiters whilst I was there. It was really messy. That was the first time I had stepped into a kitchen." But she would not be put off and kept trying for an apprenticeship until the Austin Hospital took the determined 15-year-old on.

Karen's parents desperately wanted the bright A-student to stay at school, and she reminded me that I too had advised her to continue studying. But she just wanted to cook, and after 11 months at the hospital continued her apprenticeship at Pourquoi restaurant. She then went back to trade school full time for a while and then managed to get work at Tansy's. "That was in 1989. I did three and a half years with Tansy. She gave me the basics (of French cuisine), and she taught me how to really cook." During that period, Rita Micali (now chef at Luxe) also worked with Tansy, as did Philippa Sibley-Cooke (pastry chef and owner of est est est and of Luxe –) Karen recalls how Philippa reacted against the kitchen regime there. "She's always been very strong and stood up for herself there. So one day she walked out".

When you hear some of the stories of Karen's early days of cooking you really do wonder why she stuck it out. It must come from her maternal grandmother's influence. "The family had hotels in country Victoria and many years ago when my grandfather passed away my grandmother continued to run the hotel herself in Benalla. She is a very strong woman." Her father's family were pastry chefs in Tunisia (after going there from Tuscany and Nice) and Karen has spent a lot of time with her father's mother trying to learn and document many of the dishes they grew up with - North African desserts, pastries and couscous. She loves to practise these things at home but does not put them on at the Melbourne Wine Room. "It just doesn't suit the style here."

Karen has developed a wide repertoire of mainly French and Italian dishes, from her training at Tansy's and from travelling in Europe. On coming back to Melbourne, she managed to sort out all those experiences herself, first in the kitchen of Haskins and then at the Kent. In both of these suburban hotels she was working again with Rita, and in both, they were very successful. "We developed a style there, but then after a while, each of us wanted to go our separate ways - we were pulling apart."

Karen took some time off and was then persuaded to come and try out in the kitchens at the George Hotel's Melbourne Wine Room. She has not looked back. Her cooking has taken on a new dimension here. It is much more considered, more careful and quite restrained in its combinations of flavours. The Melbourne Wine Room is a very big operation, encompassing the food for the bar and for the restaurant areas. "When we first started, the kitchen was out front and people could lean over and watch you plate up, I hated that. And I don't think the management particularly liked the customers hearing me swear" The one thing she did enjoy was being able to see the expressions on people's faces when they got the food, but the place became so busy that she couldn't serve enough food from the limited kitchen space.

Major renovations later and the kitchen is now tucked out back but the pace of cooking has not diminished. Karen has a good team around her who have been with her for more than 2 years, though she is about to lose one of her key staff to motherhood. She trains her staff very thoroughly, mainly to 'unlearn' what they have been taught elsewhere. "There's a whole generation of apprentices who are not getting the training which I did. There are only a few restaurants around with chefs in charge who can provide it. There isn't the skill level there and it takes a lot of energy. I don't run the kitchen the way I was taught, even though it gave me a certain level of discipline, I can't do it. It also requires the creation of a level of fear which I don't want to do. But I do expect a lot from my apprentices. Too many of them have not learnt the finer points, can't even segment an orange, because they have worked in 'casual dining places' where dishes aren't properly done. But here they have to learn every section." The hardest thing she finds is ensuring consistency of dishes, "it is so important, so you have to make the staff taste the dishes constantly, Some chefs don't." And that is what, she believes, causes some of the complicated concoctions that get served up elsewhere - "too many flavours on the plate and you are left trying to decipher what you are eating. I don't like that. It confuses the palate."

With the wisdom of hindsight, Karen's message to young women who want to become cooks now is to wait, to finish school and to go into it at a more mature age. Even her young sister "wanted to become a pastry chef for a little while, but I put her off."

Influences

Donovan Cooke, Tansy Goode, Rita Micali, the Martini family, the Melbourne Wine Room

Karen Martini's Recipes

Raw globe artichoke salad with carpaccio of beef
Confit salmon on white vegetable mash and truffle oil
Almond frangipane with poached quinces and chocolate honey sauce