74 GOURMET TRAVELLER
Clockwise from
top left: Noma’s
nasturtium, rose and
lovage-petal tart,
and sea buckthorn
fruit-leather butterfly,
captured by Analiese
Gregory; Lennox
Hastie at Firedoor
with visiting Danish
chef Bo Bech; Peter
Gilmore at the
National Heirloom
Expo in California;
the kitchen at San
Francisco’s Saison,
captured during
Gilmore’s US visit.Michael Ryan, chef-owner of Beechworth’s Japanese-inspired
Provenance, manages it by running food tours in Japan each year.
To date, he’s visited the country 19 times. “I might have a few days
before or after to do some more exploring,” says Ryan, “If I come
back from a trip with two or three things I’m pretty happy. Usually
it’s little garnishes or an interesting way to do something.”
On Ryan’s menu, dishes such as mackerel with dai dai ponzu,
and night-dried squid are culinary postcards from memorable
izakayas and restaurants. His trips have even led to a book project
with chef-photographer Luke Burgess about where their friends in
hospitality who live and work in Tokyo like to eat and drink.
There are also, unsurprisingly, perks to being in the industry.
Lennox Hastie, of Sydney’s Firedoor, says it’s common for chefs to
look after each other, especially when they’re visiting from other
cities. “If chefs make the journey to Sydney and they’re good
friends, typically I’ll cook for them and I won’t charge, because it’s
such an honour to have them here,” he says. “Sometimes you find
that’s reciprocated around the world, which is a really nice thing.”
While that level of generosity isn’t uncommon – Peter Gilmore
recalls asking for the bill at El Celler de Can Roca in Girona, and
being told there wasn’t one – it can have a downside. Gilmore once
left Thomas Keller’s Per Se in agony, because he felt obliged to
finish an upsized meal. “It was a 14-course dégustation that turned
into 22 courses – and they weren’t tiny,” he says. “I remember
going back to the hotel room and lying on the bed in pain. They
just wanted to show us what they could do and spoil us, but
sometimes you can kill people with kindness.”
There are gentler acts of camaraderie, too. “Massimo Bottura
once ate a steak at our restaurant and cried,” says Hastie. “Six
months later, I decided to fly 36 hours to Modena – that was
a nightmare trip – just to eat at Osteria Francescana. I smuggled
in a steak for him, and he cried again.”Sometimes, chefs can take their
research so far that they nearly bankrupt
themselves. Jacob Davey, chef at Sydney’s
Est, remembers travelling through Europe
in his 20s with his partner, with no job
and next to no savings. They’d stay in the
cheapest accommodation they could find,
and spend what little money they had
eating at fine diners.
“We went to Paris and were staying in
a backpacker hostel, but I’d put on a suit
and go to restaurants for lunch,” he says.
“I didn’t even own a suit before the trip.”
Years later, after taking over from
Peter Doyle at Est, he revisited some of
the same spots with Merivale colleague
and executive chef Dan Hong. For Hong,
the trip was something of a personal
pilgrimage. He’d taken a month off for his
long-service leave with the goal of eating
at all the restaurants that inspired him
to cook in the first place.
His list was made up of culinary
heavyweights, the likes of L’Ambroisie,
Le Bristol, Arpège, Asador Etxebarri –
all the stops you’d expect on a Michelin
marathon. He packed two suits, and
over three-and-a-half weeks, visited
four cities and ate at restaurants with
a combined total of 36Michelin stars.
Some days, it meant doubling down
on long, multi-course meals. “One day
I got a last-minute lunch booking at El
Celler de Can Roca, took an hour-and-a-
half train to get there from Barcelona
and had 24 courses, with wine. That
didn’t finish until 5.30,” says Hong.
“Then, I caught the train back for an
8.30 dinner at Disfrutar. There I had
30 courses, with wine.” Did he finish the
second meal? “I did. I forced myself.”
For Hong, a trip like that isn’t just
about ticking off a culinary bucket list,
it’s a chance to reflect. “I took away
a lot,” he says. “Even though many of
the restaurants had nothing to do with
my style of cooking, it’s always good to
see what the rest of the world is doing.”
Hong recalls the precise yet charming
service at Noma. The artful extravagance
of L’Ambroisie and the way the Basque
country’s Etxebarri takes every ingredient
back to its essence over a hot grill. To
him, these are snapshots of the kind of
magic every chef wants to recreate. And
sometimes, you have to get away from
the kitchen to be reminded of it.●