Why These Chefs

The people chosen to be in this book have one thing in common - the ability to bring a number of complex ingredients together to make a harmonious whole. That can be as simple as a plate of food or as multi-faceted as a restaurant.

They are great chefs because they develop a concept and then have the ability to translate that concept into a reality which is greater than the sum of its individual parts.

Their concern and responsibility goes beyond the kitchen as most of these chefs are owners or partners in the business they work in. There are three exceptions to this Gwenael Lesle Greg Malouf Antony Scholtmeyer but these chefs' style is a defining part of the businesses they work in.

So it is the effect of the chefs' work on the totality of existing restaurants which has merited their inclusion. For this reason, some of the fine chefs who work in the major hotels and institutions are not featured here nor are some of Australia's most important food writers and teachers (people such as Joan Campbell, Elizabeth Chong , Margaret Fulton, Diane Holuigue, Charmaine Solomn, Beverley Sutherland Smith) They too are great chefs because their work has taught and inspired many in this book.

There are also some who previously were chefs/owners of important restaurants. None of those (the teachers, writers and former chefs) have their own chapters here. We have decided to focus on people who are there today as hands on chefs/directors of restaurants and associated businesses so that this book reflects the state of the art of restauration as practised in Australia at the turn of the century..

For this reason we have not a chapter on, though many references to, Stephanie Alexander, Maggie Beer or Gay Bilson. Nor to the style icon of Melbourne restaurants of the '70's, Gloria Staley. These women are amongst the most influential chefs and restaurateurs of the past three decades.

Some of the great chefs in this book owe their status in large part to their influence and to the expertise and example of Hermann Schneider for whom many of them worked.

Of course there are always keen cooks who have great ideas, great teachers and great energy. The results of their cooking will vary for many reasons. This book is about those who use the ideas and teaching and achieve a result which works.

In making a successful restaurant, a chef has to have conceived the whole menu carefully, with all its elements and their effects on the other and then to keep that firmly in mind whilst executing each dish. Each one may change but the concept, the line, the form, should remain clear. Otherwise, every time one of the dishes is executed it becomes a matter of luck not good judgement and can't be passed on to others. There are certainly people who cook that way and produce delicious results but the impromptu cook is not a true chef, or leader , as the French term translates. A chef should be able to pass on the dish, to make it possible for others to replicate.

Making it possible means having the conditions and the staff who can execute the concept. This also means having the leadership and the discipline to achieve the teamwork and the quality.

Whilst diners may adore the results on the plate which great chefs achieve, their staff have different priorities. For them it is about learning and about gaining useful career experience. This may mean putting up with difficult and arduous conditions and with larger than life chefs' egos. It is interesting to look at some of the great chefs in action through the photos in this book. The finger pointing is an imperative, the eye and the frown and the menace evident in many chefs gaze is symptomatic of their obsession, their concern and their demand for quality.

Each chef sets their own parameters - from the 'kitchen for two' of Gary Jones in Perth to the fleet of food businesses of Neil Perry. They work within their own confines and demands. Each has its own validity, the results, the prices and the situations are as different as are the cities of Perth and Sydney.

Then there is the question of what is the 'cuisine' what is the style? It is not just the ingredients that make a cuisine, but the way those ingredients are used. And this is something which comes best from palate memory, having tasted the dishes in their country of origin or from the family.

There are many good cooks but what makes a cook great is the ability to bring together all of these elements. A chef makes a complete dish not an assemblage of unrelated tastes.

The layering of a range of complex flavours - can be as simple as one of Russell Jeavon's pizzas and as complex - as Cheong Liew's flavours dancing from one side of the plate to the other.

The ability to do that comes from imagination and technique shaped by palate.

The chef's palate is the most critical faculty and many of the great chefs bemoan the fact that their trainees don't taste as they cook. Yet neither do some of them, often because they are not physically at the stoves all of the time. Nor can they be, so staff need to be trained in this role because ingredients change their qualities over the seasons of the year. As every chef here would say, the recipes can only be a guide, you have to check as you cook. Being able to discern faults is one aspect of tasting but the further ability to bring the flavours to another dimension is quite another. But that's when you get a great dish.

That's all part too of taking time to get a perspective on what you are serving. Sadly, chefs and restaurant staff don't sit down often enough and eat through a whole dish or even a whole meal as their customers do. How often have you eaten a dish with heaps of good ideas and flavours fighting for attention?

Chefs in Australia now have access to the ideas and methods of the world's cuisines and most of the ingredients required to cook all the dishes. And sometimes you feel that you are being given a sampler plate in some restaurants, that chefs are more concerned to show off a range of produce and/or techniques than they are to present a coherent dish in which every element is complementary to the whole.

Sometimes the complexity of a chef's creation makes it impossible to enjoy. You may appreciate each individual part but cannot enjoy the totality because there is no overall harmony or balance. Part of the great chef's role is to eliminate the unnecessary. This is where leadership and the ability to step back from daily pressures is needed.

So a chef's time is very valuable and we couldn't have done this book if the chefs chosen had not given us their time and allowed us into their kitchens. There are two who were asked but who did not wish to be part of the book, - Christine Manfield of The Paramount in Sydney and Le Thu Thai of Bridgewater Mill, near Adelaide.

The final selection was made on the basis of our knowledge of the industry. As we have lived and worked in Melbourne for most of our lives, this means there is a Melbourne bias in our choices.

So there are chefs around the country, some younger than those in the book, some who have recently started their own businesses and whose reputations are still growing who may merit inclusion. With time, they may be part of the list but this first edition cannot encompass all of them.

Amongst the chefs chosen there are some whom we have known personally for many years. In areas we are less familiar with - like Western Australia we have chosen chefs, not on the basis of prior knowledge, but on the basis of meals eaten at their restaurants over 1999 whilst researching Mietta's Eating & Drinkingin Australia to be published early 2000. For the purposes of that guide we canvass many different opinions but, for the inclusion in Great Chefs of Australia, we have relied on our personal knowledge and experience.

The chefs in this book all have different gifts, different reasons for being included here. We hope you enjoy reading about them and trying their recipes. But most importantly, visit them in their restaurants, because that is a far greater expression of their talents than any words can be.