Apoorva Kunte

Hi, Apoorva, it’s really nice to be back here at The Westin.

It’s nice to have you and chat face to face with you. It’s been a while.

I feel like I come in every two years for a catch up. The first time I came in 2022 you were quite new, then we caught up again in 2024.

I can’t believe it’s 2026. Time has flown. It seems like yesterday that I was driving down from Sydney to this beautiful property, but it had some construction outside. Now you can see that the lobby is light filled. We are back to what the hotel was in its old days. And the operations are back full on, which is great.

I feel like I come here quite often. I have friends who like to catch up here. It’s actually a really great place to catch up in this beautiful lobby. It’s really comfortable, there’s good food, you can have a drink, or a cup of tea, or coffee and now that the frosting has come off these windows, it’s just so light, and you can look out onto Swanson Street, and it’s so busy out there, but it’s quite lovely and cool, and calm in here.

It is very calm. I think it’s the best place for people watching and watching life go by. I’m glad that you brought it up, that people love to come here. We call it a haven from all the hustle and bustle of the city. We are able to cater to every kind of a guest who is either visiting the theatre or here for a shopping experience and then coming down to the hotel or is passing by and sees the hotel, which is a hidden gem in itself.

That’s right. I think sometimes people, actually me, sometimes I’m not sure whether non-guests are allowed to go into hotel lobbies. And you certainly have to come in off Collins Street into that grand driveway, and someone always opens the door for you here, which is so nice. I feel like royalty. It is great to be able to utilise the beautiful hotels in Melbourne, and the Westin certainly is one of them. I sound like I’m being paid by the Westin, and I’m not. But it really is a beautiful space. You’ve been here almost five years.

Coming up to five years in November.

Is that the longest you’ve been in a venue?

No. When I started my journey early on, my first hotel chain, which is the Taj, an Indian hotel company in New Delhi, that’s where I worked the longest, and that’s where I built my base. I had eight years at that property. But five years here already, and I think I would also call this as building a base again. This is my first executive chef role after working as an executive sous and at Sheraton on the Park in Sydney, so a lot of new learnings, a lot of understanding people, new leadership styles, what works best with what kind of a group; all of that. I think I’m building my base back again.

How long does it take to settle into a role like that?

I was just thinking about it the other day. My first one and a half years, or two years, in fact, I wouldn’t say they were traumatic, but they were very unsettled. because there was a lot of moving parts. We were just coming out of COVID and we were not a fully operational hotel. The team that I had then was not used to having so many people come in at once. Whereas at Sheraton on the Park, where we were doing a quarantine operation feeding 150 dietaries, 800 people in house, with a team of 19 chefs. I was ready to go 0 to a 100 in seconds and here I had a team that I had to slowly build up. So, to answer your question, at least a minimum of two years is what I would want to take to settle into a role and then give the performance that the business deserves. Having said that, it doesn’t mean the first two you pull the business down or you are not able to perform to the best of your abilities, but, after these two years, you know the business in and out. You know what kind of guests come through. You know what they want, what they expect, and then you can give them not just above and beyond, but look into the future and plan ahead, and make sure that these guests then stay with you for a lifetime.

Who are those guests? Do you think so there’s a distinct kind of person that books The Westin?

Absolutely. With this particular hotel, it’s a mix. We’ve got guests who have been here when they were kids, and have continued to come through with their parents or grandparents, and now are bringing their children or grandchildren in. There’s that kind of a guest profile. And then there’s a lot of new achievers and that’s our target profile. These are guests who are in a fast-paced business environment. They are here for their corporate meetings. They want to make sure that they are here in the middle of the city where everything is more accessible. But then they have to look after their own lifestyle. They want a place where they can get the right kind of food, they can look after themselves by going into the gym or hitting the pool. That’s the second profile of guests. I think it’s a 50-50 split at the moment for The Westin Melbourne, where we see both these kinds of guests coming through.

Are you seeing more international guests now?

Yes, we see a lot of travellers from the U.S. at the moment. That’s pretty much because of what’s happening in the Middle East. But we’ve seen a lot of Asian travellers coming through; a big influx from India and China early on in the year. Now it’s more the Americas that’s opened up for us.

I think anyone who works hard would like some acknowledgement or even a thank you at the end of the day. This is a great job. It doesn’t matter how big or small you are if you’re a CEO of a company or starting fresh in the office room, it’s always good to be recognised. These awards just cement that recognition and say, we are headed the right way. The awards might not always come to you, but even being nominated for one, or being shortlisted for one, is good enough to say, okay, yes, we must be doing something right to be recognised for that.

Apoorva Kunte, The Westin Melbourne

Getting back to your title, executive chef, I know a lot of chefs listen to this podcast, so they probably already know what that means, but I also know a lot of lay people, people who aren’t in hospitality like to listen. What does executive chef mean?

A very simple definition would be someone who leads the culinary brigade of a hotel or an establishment, right from influencing the kinds of menus or the concepts for the food and beverage outlets, to ensuring that every guest experience that’s related to food and beverage as well is seamless. It is someone who leads by example, that is my kind of an executive chef. I’ve always worked with executive chefs who have been like that, where we are not sitting in an office space, we are working hand in glove with the team on the pans, from peeling onions to making a jus to actually going out and speaking to a guest. Everything is done in that role.

As you progress up through the ranks from when you start off as a chef, and you work your way up, and then as a head chef, you have to do that financial side of things and work out food costs and then, as you say, as an executive chef, you’re in charge of a lot more people, and a there are a lot more moving parts, do you get training in that, or is that something you have to learn on the job?

We do get the basic training while we are in hotel school. This is based on my personal experience. But it’s like any other school format, the training that you do get in school is very different than what you actually experience when you’re on the job or on the floor. But at least it makes you understand that this is what is expected, or you should know a lot of these elements to be successful in the role. But I have learned a lot of what I know being on the job over the years, and working with some great chefs, following them and staying back after long hours and picking their brains as to understand why they have done this a certain way. And then taking the best out of that and writing my own book of songs.

You’re on the pans, but you’re also overseeing everything. What does a typical day look like?

A typical day for me starts around seven o’clock; coming in, not checking my emails, but directly jumping on and seeing the breakfast operations. I believe that for a hotel, breakfast is one of the most important operations of the day. We might not have all our guests come and dine with us for lunch or dinner, but we definitely know that they will come in for breakfast. I like to ensure that the operation is running smoothly and seamlessly, the standards that we have set up are all in check. I like meeting some of them as well early in the morning. We might have some guest feedback from the day prior, so we try and catch up with them when they are having their breakfast and also understand how we can be much better than what they had expected. It is an opportunity for improvement. Then I go and check my emails; that’s an hour of checking and responding to a lot of emails.

What sort of emails do you get?

It’s more about sales. A lot of the admin is looking at the food safety aspect of it. We are ensuring that all the breeds that we’ve done the day prior are completed. We get a lot of log entries, or information being passed on from the team. I read through all of that information. There are the financials: we get the numbers early in the morning from the day prior. I look at all the rostering. That’s the first or the second hour of it, then I go into our morning meeting with all the head of departments. That’s a 15, 20 minute quick brief of what’s happening on in our day, what’s expected in the week to follow. Then I go and work on the floor with the team. We’ve got a lot of events happening which start from 11 o’clock onward, so I make sure all the food’s prepared and ready to go, the salads are prepared fresh, the sandwiches are made fresh in the morning, High tea is one of our very popular offerings, so I check everything’s there. There are also days where I do all of these things and then I’m running the section by myself because someone has called in sick or they have had to rush out for some reason. Then two to three o’clock is my time again to finish up all the ordering for the next day. And then three o’clock onwards, I work with the afternoon shift, because they start to come in at three o’clock. We have a briefing with them and pass on the same information that we’d learned about it in the morning. Then I work with them till around sic o’clock. That’s when I call it a day and then go home.

That’s a long day.

Yes, it is. But I don’t always have long days. There are some days where I try and leave on time and give that time to the family, or actually go to the gym and get a work out. Because that’s my stress buster of sorts.

Yes, of course. You have to look after yourself, too, it’s such a physical job, isn’t it? You’re on your feet so much. of the day.

I think while it is a physical job, there are tasks which are very repetitive, like slicing, chopping, cutting, looking down. Yes, we are on our feet, but the exercise isn’t targeting the right body parts. It’s all the wrong ones that, later on, give us trouble in our lives: our backs and our necks. I try to be fit to ensure that those troubles don’t come through.

Good thinking. And in terms of creativity, because you’re a very curious chef who loves to find out more about things. Within a hotel setting, can you still be creative?

Oh, absolutely. There’s so much more, in fact, that you can do, in a hotel setting, than a stand-alone restaurant setting. We’ve got two restaurants at the Westin: one serves High Tea, and an all-day offering of finger food, sandwiches, burgers, and fast moving food, not fast food, but fast service food, while the other one’s more relaxed where we do the breakfast service and allegro, followed by a dinner service. There are pretty much three different avenues or four different avenues where we can continue to be creative. And this is not even touching on the events that we have, where we can do a lot of live stations, create robust, customised menus for each and every guest who comes through and say, how can I wow you? I think there is much more creativity when you work for a hotel. There’s also welcome amenities that come through for a guest who’s arriving and staying with us. We look up their profile and research what does he or she like? We can be more creative and go above and beyond to make their welcome experience really excellent.

When you’re coming up with some of those ideas for food, is that more of a team effort, or do you have a few thoughts, and then you bring them to a team?

I think I’ve evolved, and that’s where, when I said, I’ve built myself, or this is my building base. Earlier, I would always think, oh, it’s my shop: it’s my way or the highway. Through my sous chef years, I started to evolve and become more of a team player. Coming into this role, I did give the direction of what we wanted to achieve. But then I leave it to the team and let their creative juices flow as well, because I can only point you towards a certain aspect of it and then see what you come up with. We can always tweak and make it better if it’s required. But other than other than that, a lot of the times the team does a wonderful job.

I see that you win a lot of awards, you and the hotel, but you, in particular. Is that important to you to have that acknowledgement?

Absolutely. I think anyone who works hard would like some acknowledgement or even a thank you at the end of the day. This is a great job. It doesn’t matter how big or small you are if you’re a CEO of a company or starting fresh in the office room, it’s always good to be recognised. These awards just cement that recognition and say, okay, yes, we are headed the right way. The awards might not always come to you, but even being nominated for one, or being shortlisted for one, is good enough to say, okay, yes, we must be doing something right to be recognised for that.

Is there an example of winning or one of those that you’ve been nominated for recently that’s been particularly special for you?

Recently there was a chef’s competition, which was tapas through a hotel school in Spain. People from different continents of the world competed, and we had to send our recipes, picture them, do a video, and send that through. I sent mine from this hotel. I had some of the team members also send their own creative ideas. We had four or five recipes that went into the competition from just our hotel alone. I’m not sure about what other properties did. But one of them was shortlisted, and I won the silver medal for it, and this was across the world, because they were participating in hotels and restaurants from everywhere, including Spain, India, Americas, and New Zealand as well. I was pretty happy and chuffed about the fact.

What was the tapas?

I infused a lot of native ingredients into a tart. It was a smoked duck tart, which was served with beetroot and Davidson plum mousse, and then it was topped up with a wattle seed tuile.

I feel as though you have been getting a bit more into native ingredients recently? Did do something last year?

We did a high tea called NativiTea. Each High Tea stand is around 10 elements, and all of those 10 elements included one native ingredient, either as a flavouring, or as a spice element to it. I’m also hosting a dinner in a week from now, where it’s a six course menu, which is completely inspired by Australian native produce, and each course, including the four canapes that we serve before the event starts, have a native ingredient in them. There’s just so much flavour profile that hasn’t been explored. And yes, you can see a lot of them being used everywhere from a Coles supermarket shelf, in cakes and cookies, to jams being produced, to restaurants. But what I truly love about what I do is to bring in my experience of flavour profile from my heritage in India, the travels that I’ve done, and use the Australian native ingredients and fuse them all. Maybe I’ll make it into a curry or make it into a tapas or a dessert, which people are not used to. That’s what drives me.

Did you get to go to Spain?

No.

That’s a shame. I know another big piece for you is wastage. That must be really hard in a big hotel. What are some things you have to think about?

There are a lot of things that we have to think about, because most of the hotels would have a breakfast buffet, so that’s where the biggest amount of wastage usually comes from. What we’ve done is, we’ve cross utilised a lot of our menus, the ingredients that are going on to those menus, across the à la carte options and the buffet options. I’ll give you an example: if we’re getting a chorizo sausage for breakfast, then that chorizo is also being used to make a ragu, or it might be used to make a breakfast wrap. We are not getting 100 ingredients into the hotel, and there’s just one use. When we open a packet, because most of them are food service packets, there’s at least a minimum of 1 kilo to 2.5 kilos of ingredient in each packet. Sometimes you use one kilo and then you wait for the next time it’s used, and what do you do right for the rest of it? You end up throwing it in the bin because it’s past its used by date. So rather than doing that, if we are cross utilising those ingredients across our menus through the day, then that already uses them. We don’t have a lot of wastage from that point. We do get some leftovers or wastage after the buffet gets over. But to counter that, we’ve reduced the size of our service ware, including the serving dishes. Earlier, you’d walk into a restaurant and you’d want everything full, really topped up. We’ve made that into halves. So instead of one full dish, there’s two halves going into it, and that gives me an opportunity to increase the variety of food that we put on, but at the same time, less food. I think it’s human mentality that the more variety, the less we eat because we want to try a little bit of everything. We only top up the dish when it’s almost finished.

You must go through so many eggs, do you? What do you do with eggshells?

We send it them for compost and fertiliser. We have a company that collects them.

You have to be really innovative, don’t you, to think of what to do with all those things. Now, since I last saw you, you and your wife have welcomed a little baby into the family. Congratulations. What are you most looking forward to getting him to try food wise?

Oh, absolutely, everything. He’s 16 months old now. I keep telling my wife, he’s one baby who must have tried everything already: he’s had quinoa, he’s had butter chicken, and mind you, it’s not reducing the spice content of the mix. He’s tasted all of that. We’ve been  to Phuket, whit him where he tried all the Thai food. We’ve done a trip with him to Sydney. Wherever we go, we try and give him what we are eating as well, or at least a small taste of it. He gets used to a lot of different flavour profiles as well, so it’s good to see that he’s not fussy. He loves to eat everything. He’s also tried a lot of Australian natives ingredients, because I did a small pop up while I was visiting India, and I had a lot of native produce and we had some leftover at home: wattleseeds, native thyme, river mint. We made some salsas and made them into a lamb puree, and he’s had that as well. He’s across it all.

Sounds great. What are you most looking forward to this year coming up at the Westin?

I think what I’m really looking forward to is the entire operation in full swing. We’ve had this construction outside the hotel for a while, and finally at the end of last year, it was done. The town hall station is all constructed. The previous four years, that I’ve been here, the occupancy was a little lower than what the hotel is used to. We had to cancel a lot of events sometimes because of noise outside the hotel. There were less guests coming through because the hotel was not physically visible from street level. Now that all of that is gone, occupancy is really high. We are getting recognised again. I’m really looking forward to doing an entire year with without any interruptions and testing the team that we’ve built now to ensure we can actually deliver consistently? So far, touchwood, we have. We are the number one ranked hotel in all of Marriott for food quality. That means all the guests who stay with us rate us at the end of their stay, and we are the highest ranked across all of Australia and New Zealand. I’m really proud of the team for that.

The Westin Melbourne, 205 Collins Street, Melbourne