Ned's Bake had me at their "local European" branding. I think it is the French teacher in me. So then I was flicking through their Instagram and saw a lovely photo of Ned with head chef, Remya creating the week's dinner menu together at Middle Park. They have their arms around each other's shoulders and theyre smiling widely. I really loved the idea of the teamwork and mutual respect the photo showed. I messaged Remya to see if she would like to have a chat with me and happily for me, she said yes. I usually like to read up on the chefs I chat to so I can think about the questions I want to ask, but Remya has flown under the media and social media radar. Meeting her was such a lovely discovery. Remya has had a wealth of experience in the hospitality industry, growing up and learning her trade in Italy before spending time in the Canary Islands and then coming to Australia. We met at the end of a weekday when Ned's was shutting at 4pm, so I will absolutely head back over there for dinner and try one of Remya's pastas one evening very soon.
Hi Remya, how was your day?
All good, keeping busy in the kitchen.
Are you new at Ned's?
I've been here three and a half years.
And always as head chef?
I've been head chef for about a year and a half. I don't have the experience of other big head chefs who have been doing it for ages.
What interests me with Conversation with a chef is hearing everyone's story because I think there are so many stories and variations on those stories and I always like to hear those stories.
I'm a bit shy.
Don't be shy. I am genuinely interested in what you've done and how you got here. Were you born in India but you're Italian?
Yeah, so I was born in India and my parents are Italian. They adopted me when I was seven years old. We are from Modena. I lived there for 15 years. My cheffing started really early. At 14 years old I was already in the kitchen helping, you know in one of those little country towns, there's a plaza with one cafe and one restaurant and I started my apprenticeship. When I came to Italy, the first thing I did was start playing with flour and salt and my mum asked me what I wanted to do when I was an adult and I said, I think I want to be a chef.
What do you think it is that drew you in; do you think it is the satisfaction of making the food or being around that hospitality context?
Exactly. I love being in the kitchen. It is the place where I am the most settled and relaxed and it brings out the best in me. Also, for my Italian parents, it is all about food. We always ate together and the timing was always the same; 12 o'clock: lunch, 7 o'clock: dinner, that's it and everyone is in the kitchen and then having donner together.
I started my apprenticeship at 14 and then decided to go to school, finished my course and then started in summer going to that restaurant and then that hotel and I saw properly how the kitchen works and saw the environment, and I loved it. I finished school and started working full time at a rustic kitchen in the middle of nowhere but really fine flavours; so simple with things you can't find in city restaurants. They used the type of produce that is very particular, like the beef. There was a carpaccio chianina that had a really complex flavour, it had a wild taste and intense but at the same time gentle when they plated it. The flavour was like an explosion and you cannot find that in the city and that's why I liked it.
When I spoke to Esca Khoo a few weeks ago, he was saying the same thing; that he wanted to try working in all kinds of different cafes and restaurants to get a wide range of experience. So you were in Italy doing that and then what was next?
I worked for ten years in Italy in restaurants and hotels. I ended up doing CdP at 18 years old in a four-star hotel. It was really tough for me then. In Italy chefs are really strong in terms of expectation. If you make a little mistake, they throw the pan at you and say, it's creamy! Why did you do that? It was very tough, but I am very grateful because otherwise I would not be a head chef here now.
It's interesting, because I have often heard about that whole brigade idea and the harshness in London and here in the nineties and later it was very much like that and people say it's good because it teaches you discipline and the right way of doing things and then other people have been hurt by that. You have to get the right balance.
Yes, that's right. It's tough work working in the kitchen, but I believe if you have the right discipline, at the same time, you can go along with the passion you have and work through 20 or 30 years and never stop. Some people try, they work hard but it is to much and they leave. For me, that discipline we were talking about is a goal I needed to reach and now here I am doing my own menu.
We are doing dinner three nights; Thursday, Friday and Saturday. We are doing a simple menu; three entrees, one steak, one pasta, one risotto, a couple of sides and a dessert. It feels awesome. I feel awesome.
How many does it seat?
Around 30. It's perfect.
It's Neds local European but would you say that you are tending towards Italian, maybe Mediterranean influences?
Yes. That's right. He was actually telling me last week, Remy we should do something more French, Spanish, European because I have been more focussing on Italian because that is my background and what I know. But he is right, it would be nice to try not just Italian.
It's always nice to explore different things too, isn't it? Do you have lots of cookbooks or do you look at Instagram? What's your inspiration?
I do have a couple of cookbooks but my inspiration is mostly Instagram. I love the website Great British Chefs. It's the best. It's where you find lots of techniques there. It's like Gronda.I don't know if you know it. You pay maybe monthly and they give you the best advice and techniques with a video. It is like fine dining for a normal person. It's really nice.
I love being in the kitchen. It is the place where I am the most settled and relaxed and it brings out the best in me.
What made you come to Australia?
Love.
Aw. That's good.
I came here in 2015. I was in Spain for five years. I was in the Canary Islands. The food is very simple, you can't have expectations there. Fine dining there is an average restaurant here. But I loved the quality time.
Absolutely. What an amazing lifestyle.
Yes, I was working in the hotel and surfing every day. That was my life. And yeah, I came here for love. I met an Australian from Launceston, in Tasmania, and so I moved here. I moved to Cairns where she was living at the time.
I worked in a cafe straightaway. I wanted a change and I hadn't realised that here in Australia, cafes have a strong vibe. They are not cafes just doing coffee and a croissant. Here cafes are a concept. I started work in the morning and I enjoyed it and I kept doing that. But now Ned wants me to work nights.
It's only three nights, isn't it?
It is three nights, but you never know because we are going to expand in a month. He might open more nights. We'll see.
It's still nice and local, though. I don't imagine you'll have big late noisy nights.
No, you finish at 10pm and go home.
Would you have ever imagined that you would be in Melbourne cooking, when you started your chef career?
No, absolutely not. That's a really good question. No. But when I was 18, I met a lot of chefs and I remember one of them was a pizza chef who was 10 years older than me and he was telling me that he was going to go to Australia and make lots of money and he asked me to go with him. But I was to busy and I said no. But Australia has called me all my life. Even my father loves Australia, so I had to come here.
What are you favourite things to cook and share with other people, perhaps things from your background?
I really love to do ragu, duck ragu and I really love to do lasagne; different kinds of lasagne, vegetarian, cheesy. I'm more pasta because that is where I am from. Fresh pasta; agnolotti, agnolini, tortellini. They are my favourite things to do. If I have a dinner with my friend, I will just make pasta, a lot of pasta.
Can you get all the things you need here, in terms of produce and so on?
Yes. Honestly, I am very impressed. I was thinking that the flour tends to be really different form Italy, but if you balance all the ingredients, it's not the same because the produce is different in every single place but I'm really impressed that you can find anything from the shops and suppliers have things that I can't even believe they have. In Melbourne you are everywhere, that's my thought.
When you have some free time, do you like to cook at home or do you go out to eat?
I love going out to eat. It's what keeps me interested in new flavours and products. Sometimes I have been cooking all day and I just want someone to cook for me.
Of course. Do you have a favourite place you like to go?
There are a couple. I find that Bistro Gitan is really good; it's one of my favourites. And Yagiz. And for good steak, I would recommend the Botanical Hotel. It's amazing; the steak is so good there.
I love all those places. Thank you so much, Remya.
40 Armstrong Street, Middle Park