Adrian Richardson

Thanks for doing this. I've actually been wanting to talk to you for such a long time. I think I have attempted before and then something happened and then there was Covid. Its really nice to finally be here. La Luna has been around for 25 years. I just find that so impressive in this climate where restaurants open and close and there are all sorts of challenges. Congratulations and happy birthday.

Thank you very much. I'm 25 again. It has been great. I've really enjoyed it. I've been able to do what I want with this place. I've been able to do the style of food and work with people that I enjoy working with. That's where I wanted to go and it seems to have worked really well. I think when I first started, there was a lot of the Brit pack fancy, fluffy type of food. And I just didn't really get that, you know, for me it's about meat and stuff that's brought together. Ive enjoyed being able to do this, and it's allowed me to do so many other things; getting into the media and so on and I've really enjoyed that part of it as well. It has been a lot of fun.

So, young Adrian, when you opened this restaurant, did you imagine that you would still be here 25 years on?

At the age of 18, when I started my apprenticeship, I always knew that I wanted to go into business for myself. I did everything I possibly could to learn as much as I could. When I started, I had some skills behind me. Did I think I'd be here in 25 years? I don't know. I just really wanted to give it a go and make it work. I'm shocking if I start something, I've got to do it. I've got to finish it. I've got to be good at it. I'm horrible with that stuff. I will not let go until I make it work.

What does make a restaurant like this work and what makes it last?

You know what it is? It's the people. The people that I've worked with here, and there's some long-term people, you know, Linda, Lauren, Angelo, some of the staff that keep on coming back. We spoke to a guy outside. He's been working off and on for four years. You know, we just call him back. He's lovely. And he loves coming. Every time we call him, he comes back. I find it's the people that are around me that make it really, really enjoyable and exciting. If I come in and I'm not feeling that great, I've got the two girls here that will slap me around the head and give me a coffee and tell me to get on with it. We all work together, and I find that's the exciting part that keeps me interested. That's the challenging part. And I love that.

And I guess it's the locals and the following that you have as well. I heard you saying in an interview that people come back several times a week.

When you open a restaurant, there's a couple of ways of thinking about it as a chef. The tendency would be to think, I'm a great chef. I'm going to show you how amazing I am, and all the beautiful food, and I'm going to teach you the customer how to eat and dine. That's one way of doing it. But I come from a different way. I think, what do you want? What do I think people would want to eat? And I design a place around me being the customer. What do I want; the style of food, the style of service, the price point, all of these things coming together is the way I would think about it. And then, being a chef of 35 years and generations beforehand, Im a very skills-based chef. I like to make everything. Everything's made on the premises. That's what we do. And I think it comes together. If I come to a restaurant and I'm buying some prosciutto, it's nice if I get it from overseas in Italy, but I can get that in any other restaurant around here. The prosciutto that you saw hanging outside my office here, there's only one place in the world you can get that, that is made here. It's cured and air dried here, sliced and put on a plate. The only place in the world you can get that, unless I take a leg with me and slice it somewhere else. To me, that's quite important. I'm not buying food in and fluffing it up. I'm giving you what we make warts and all.

I was thinking, you have a book called Meat, and there's a lot of meat here. And in this day and age a lot of people are on about eating less meat and more vegetables. But what you are doing still works, doesn't it?

Well, on that point, we should eat less meat. Definitely. Meat's a very easy thing to get. Once we start demanding cheaper meat, we start going into the factory farming. And that's another thing altogether for me. I buy really good stuff. I pay top dollar for it. We do the right thing to it, and we charge you top dollar for it. For me, that's where we want to go. We should eat less meat, pay more for better quality meat, and eat more vegetables. It's healthy. To me that's really important. But I think we go down a line where it's easy to put a piece of chicken on or whatever, and cook it, whereas vegetables take a little bit more thought. I think the more people learn to cook and enjoy vegetables, the better they're going to be. And then come here for a great steak. I'll look after the steak. I look after all the beautiful things. Thats the way I think it should be. I don't eat a lot of meat. I taste a lot of meat. But really, if I have too much wagyu, I can't eat it. I love a piece of fish. I like a salad or a soup or something. Pastas my love.

Do you make pasta?

All the pasta's made here on the premises. I have an Italian background. Um, my mother's Italian. Okay. And I grew up in an Italian family, so even though I don't look it, pasta is one of my favourite things. There are always two or three different pasta dishes, handmade on the premises at any time. If you come back to my house, 10 o'clock at night, we get home from work, have a glass of wine. You sit at the counter over there, and I'll make Assassin's pasta or something.

Tell me about that. What is Assassin's pasta?

It's a dish I came across a while ago, but I have to practise things a lot. So I've been making it a lot. Basically, if you can imagine a dried spaghetti, you've got a handful of that. And then in a non-stick fry pan or a cast iron fry pan, you'll have some olive oil, crushed garlic and some chili, and you might add some capers, anchovy, any of those sorts of things. Fry them off until they are golden, put the spaghetti in rock hard, straight from the packet, straight in. And in a jug you'll have some water with some tomato paste or some tomato passata, about 10% of that, so you've got the blood red colour of the liquid and you add that to the spaghetti and just keep moving it around with tongs so it doesn't stick together. It softens up, and then it starts to fry, and you add more liquid to it, and it goes crispy. And you keep going. It's a lovely dish to cook. It's very interactive. I love it. Very simple. It's an old school, one pan dish. I love that.And 'assassins', because the liquid that you add is coloured red with the tomato passata, or the paste. So it's the blood of the person you've just killed.

Nice. I read that you thought you might become a pilot.

Yes. When I was 16, I was put up a year at school. My brother and I were 11 months apart. And my mother forged my birth certificate and put me up a year, which was a great idea at the time, however, I always struggled at school. I was always that year younger, and it makes a difference, I think, and so I always struggled. I went to a really good grammar school and, and then at the age of probably 16 and a half, halfway through Year 11, my services were no longer required. I was home, no school. And dad was an airline pilot. I'd always loved flying. He said, do you want to start some flying lessons? So I started flying lessons, and at 16, I was doing my first solos. I was flying by myself in a plane, doing circuits and things. Dad said, look, you have to get a job to pay for your lessons. So I did. I got a job in the kitchen, paid for my lessons. And I really fell in love with the kitchen. I got a job in a restaurant. And I'm still friends with that guy. He is an older Italian guy, beautiful man. So I suddenly fall in love with the kitchen and less with the flying. I went back to school, did my year 11 again, repeated in the right year that I should have been, did year 12. And then to the horror of everyone, friends, family, teachers, everyone, I started my apprenticeship as a chef. In those days, it wasn't like it is now where it is on TV and everything's fabulous. It was grinding it out in a sweaty hot kitchen with crazy chefs screaming and yelling. But I belonged there. There's no other place for me.

What is it that you loved and still love about it?

I love the creative side of it. You can be quite creative. I love food and always have. Everything is about food for me. I love the discipline and the organisation. Kitchens can be very disciplined, organised societies. Theres a hierarchy. If you have a good day and you achieve a lot of things, you get a pat on the back. If you stuff up, you get a clip around the ears. It is very regimented and organised. And I like that. I like that self-discipline for myself.

And I love the camaraderie. I love the service. It doesn't matter how good you are, at six o'clock, when punters walk in that door, if you are not ready and you can't deliver, you're gone. Go do something else. But that adrenaline, that intenseness of the service where you have to be focused and you have to be right. Everything has to come out right. I love that adrenaline. It's like a blood sport to me.

I've just binged two seasons of The Bear.

Everyone's telling me about it, I have to watch it.

Well Season two is just sublime. It's so cinematic and amazing, but there are a lot of really anxiety inducing moments while watching it because he's under pressure. There's a moment when all the dockets are just flying out the machine.

I've seen them where they come out of the docket machine and they spool around and they hit the floor. You have those nights in big kitchen, where its, were in the shit! But to me, I think, okay, we're going to get out of this. It's not like anyone's going to die. You can panic and you can go crazy, or I'm quite organized and I can bring it into focus. We're going to be fine guys, let's just do this. You break it into blocks, you do this, you do this, and you work through it slowly. And you tell the front of house guy to pull out the magazine trolley because it's going to take a while, or get some drinks for them, it's all going to come out. I love that type of thing. But yeah, it can be anxious for people watching it.

Obviously I love talking chefs. I've got a podcast called that, but I'm always so in awe of how you juggle all those things. I like cooking, but then when you're doing it in this large scale, all different timings, I just find that so incredible.

Timing's really important. You need to know how to work that stuff. But if you've been doing it for long enough, and if you've had a good background from doing functions of 2000 people to five people. If you can do everything in between and then big kitchens, small kitchens. I always say, chefs have to work in lots of different places so that when you get to a stage where you're starting to take control, it's easy to put it together. I find a lot of chefs just work in restaurants, food's great and that's all they learn. But we're doing a function for 200 people, how do we do this? But that's the fun part. We can teach you that. It's not hard. If I can do it, anyone can do it.

Maybe. And then where does TV fit into it? How did that even come about?

I started getting a lot of attention when I first opened this place doing interviews and those sorts of things. And then I was asked to do little commercials and things. It just picked up from there. There was a young lady, Justine May, who's an agent for chefs. She runs Talent Inc. or Chefs Inc in those days. Everyone you see on tv, she's their agent, so she's fantastic. I started doing little gigs here and there. Then Ready Steady Cook, and then we did Boys Weekend, and Good Chef, Bad Chef. Then I teamed up with two other guys, and we produced, Secret Meat Business ourselves. Then Richo's Bar Snacks, which was a lot of fun. Producing was incredible how we put all that together. But I just love it. I love the performance side of it, and I love the teaching side of it. I really enjoy making it. There were small teams. There are two, three cameramen, a sound guy, a director, producer, and maybe one other food guy. A very tight team. You do 6, 8, 12-week blocks. You really connect with them all, and it's great. To me, making TV is a very intimate thing with these people. What goes on, stays in the studio. Then you come out of the studio and people say, oh we love watching you on. I don't get that. I don't see that side of it.

You are very personable on the screen, and I feel it's almost like you're making eye contact with the viewer. Did you have to learn that, are you imagining people watching you or are you just doing it to the camera? What does go through your head?

I learned the hard way with a lot of this stuff. I was nervous talking to people, nervous in front of a camera, but I would pick up any two-bit job for no'hing. If you gave me a packet of cigarettes, Id do anything, just to do it and learn it. I like to learn things. I have to break it apart and have to master things, and then I can move on. Unless I master it's very difficult for me to stop. I have to keep doing it again and again. With the tv, I would listen to directors and they would give me tips, and suggest things to try. But you just have to do it. Some people have it, some people don't. I'm very lucky. I can stand up in front of people and perform. It's not easy. You have to learn and practise, and you have to know what you're doing before you step up there. But with TV, you get on the screen and you see a black dot. It can be very intimidating to a lot of people. I don't mind. It's easy for me. In fact, if I know the camera crew, just off centre is the cameraman that I'm looking at sometimes and my job is to make him frigging laugh. If I can make him laugh because I'm looking at him or down the barrel, that's what I'm doing. But you learn pretty quickly. You have to have eyes on the camera. I'm including you, I'm looking at you. I'm in your house looking at you. The ones that are just starting, they're always looking down. They're always looking around. You have to be looking at the camera. I look at you because we're having a conversation. You have to keep coming back and doing that thing. How did you learn it? I learnt it by doing a lot of it. Good chef, bad chef. 65 episodes by 13 years. So 800 or something episodes.

That's the other thing you have to keep up that too, don't you, and the energy. Every episode might be the first episode someone watches.

That's the performance side. So to do that, I'm very low key and calm. I have an office in the studio, so I'm very quiet. I keep the office dark and I don't do a lot. Then we go into the kitchen, into the studio. I set everything up. I work with the producer. It's all there, ready to go and we run through it with the camera guys. You go through all the pickups and show them the order that you're going to do things. As soon as the camera goes on, We're going to cook some lovely spaghetti carbonara. I've got some great bacon. I've got some free range eggs. I've got some cream. Not everyone likes to put cream in the carbonara, and some Parmesan. You lift for that sort of thing. And then you can bring it down again. If you are able to control your energy level, then you're able to deliver when you need to. Without burning all your energy off. I keep very calm like this. And then when you need to lift for it, you've got the energy.

Is it scripted?

No. I struggle with scripts, and I struggle with reading things. I would do a lot of commercials in the States. I was flying over to do commercials for Outback Steakhouse, actually. That was a lot of fun They didn't even bother from the start. They knew me. I don't do scripts. They would do is have a prompter. I'd memorize the lines or the paragraph and then deliver it. With the sort of thing that I do, you have little tricks, I have 10 ingredients there that I'm going to put into a pan and cook. I can say something about every single one of those things. Whether it makes the cut or not, it doesn't matter. But you've got something to say about every single one of those things and move on. And if you've got that, you can keep talking and you can keep the energy up. It works. I'm quite meticulous with setting up and what I'm doing. Once you've got that set up, then you can have fun. Cook something. I love cooking. If you came to my house and we were cooking Assassin's Pasta or something, it is almost a performance at home. I would do that normally. I love that part of it.

I was just thinking when you were saying that, I guess it's an age old performance skill. That's what they used to do in medieval times. The troubadours riding around the countryside, telling their stories. They had little things in place to insert to keep the story going and to remember it and so it would last a whole evening. I suppose we've always done that. It is a bit about storytelling, isn't it? Your storytelling stories about the food.

Well, if you know your topic, you can go on a journey. Ive given talks on my career and where it's gone and how it's started and where I've gone to. It might be for the Angus Society, breeders of Australia. I've got the other bit I'll alternate at the end, which is about the beef cattle. So they'll ask me to do this part and talk about how it relates to the beef. I memorize that 45-minute talk. I write it, I take meticulous notes, I have notebooks everywhere. I write it, I memorize it. Sometimes I actually do a talk with the notebook in my hand. You'll see stuff off on YouTube and think, what's that in his hand? That's the notebook. Because I have it all here. That's how I do it. You keep your delivery paced and flowing. If you miss something and you remember later on you can go back and say, Oh, I forgot to tell you something and then you can bring the stories together. It's all here in my head. If you have that confidence, you can do it. I've never answered questions like this before. This is quite interesting. I've done different things, but these are very interesting questions.

Oh good. That makes me happy.

Do you use a notebook for ideas for food as well? New dishes, for example, or things you want to put have on the menu?

There are a couple ways I do it. I'm very visual, so I go through social media. I see a lot of stuff. I follow a lot of people that I really like what they do. I'll pick up stuff, screenshot it, and then save it and go back to it later on, things I see on the computer, Pinterest, those sorts of things. I'll research stuff there. YouTube, if I want to work on techniques and watch people producing something, I'll use that. Not so much books anymore. I used to have heaps of books, not so much anymore. I'm quite visual. I go out to a lot of restaurants at the moment. I've got a few restaurants around the place. So I eat out a lot. I usually take a photo of everything and I keep all the meus, just for reference. Then if I like things, I can go back and pull things in and out that I want to do. Sometimes there's some great stuff and sometimes there's some absolute freaking crap. Recently I was in Brisbane and there's a style of food that everyone's doing it. You can see menus are very similar. Some people are really good at it. Um, and this one I had on Tuesday, Wednesday night was terrible. The person I was with was a regular person who doesn't work in kitchens. And they said, this is really average.That's disappointing. But I took notes on it. I picked up all the things they did wrong and I picked up the reasons why. You know what an example would be? The crumbed veal chop that they had. They left it thick. What you should do is hammer it out so it's quite even and thin. And then fried. They cooked it in clarified butter, which was great for the first side, but when they turned it over, all the crusty bits breadcrumb were on the bottom. The first thing I'll do when it hits the table, I turn the thing over. If there's going to be a violation, it's the first one I look for. So I saw that. Then the chop, they had these from the top end here, which is up near the chuck, round the bone was tough and chewy. But these are things that I'll register and write down and take a photo of. When I came in, I spoke to Alex, who's my head chef here. We talked about it. Good stuff is great. But also mistakes are really important as well. And if I see other people's mistakes, I learn from their mistakes. That's really important.

And can you still be surprised by flavour or by food?

Yes. I ate in a place last night, ESSA in Brisbane. The chef there, Phil, I like his style. It's simple food. Just done really well. He's just got some great techniques and the way he cut things and the way he sort of put things together and just beautifully done. And you'll come across these people every now and again. He is a beautiful cook. He understands the ingredients and delivers them properly. When you come across people like that, it's really nice.

There is a lot of talk these days about wellbeing. How do you manage wellbeing for yourself and maybe for your staff? Is that a thing that you have to think about now?

I've always worked six days a week. That's just me. I'm a shocker to be around if I'm not busy. But when we came back from Covid, which was I think an incredible time for everyone. I got a lot out of it. When we came back, you know, La Luna was open six days, lunch and dinner, Tuesday to Sunday. And Linda and I were sitting down, and I said, I don't want to do that anymore. I can't do it anymore. If we going to be able to work together for the next five to 10 years in this place? That's where we got to after Covid. We open five nights a week and we open two lunches, have one crew that runs it. We don't work Sundays anymore. We don't work Mondays. We close for a month over Christmas. We close for five, six days over Easter. We close public holidays.

That's great. It's very French actually. This enjoyment of life and having holidays and not working on Sundays and those kinds of things. Whatever we might say about the French and I can say this because I'm a French teacher. I love France and French, and they really do know how to do life.

Yes. The food and the wine and, 'we are the best at this'. If you want to eat and drink and be merry and do all these things the French will show you how to do it. The Italians are pretty good as well. But the French put the polish on it and the glamour. Our base in cookery is French, so everything we do is in French in the terminology. I love it. My grandfather when he was in the Savoy Hotel, he had to learn to speak, read, and write in French so that he could pass himself off as a Frenchman. It was the only way he could rise up through the ranks in kitchens, because the top level was French. They really hold onto that and they are very good at it.

I was recently speaking to Ben, the head chief at Pipi's kiosk in Albert Park, right on the beach. He spent a year in Paris and didn't have any French, but luckily he had someone who, who really loved ACDC, so he could forge connections. but then I follow a New Zealand chef who has gone over to France to help a mate out doing the menu for a manoir over there and he doesn't speak any French, and he's finding it really difficult. It's tricky when you can't express yourself with the people that you work with, you can feel a bit one dimensional, can't you?

Language in kitchens can be very difficult. It's very common in a lot of kitchens to have people from all over the world. I'm fluent in broken English, but going overseas is very different.

Have you cooked overseas?

Yes. I lived in Canada for a year and worked over there. I lived in London for a year and a bit, and worked over there. I've worked in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Manila, Korea, the States as well. I've been able to travel to lots of places and work. But they're glamour gigs. They fly you in, look after you. Its nice.

I also find that impressive the way chefs go into other people's kitchens and can just do it. You're going into an unfamiliar kitchen, but then all of your knowledge just comes into play and you can just do it wherever you are. That feels hard.

Well, we talked before about the French techniques. Most of us speak that language. Most of us understand what we're doing when we talk about certain things. There is quite a brotherhood or sisterhood or fellowship with chefs. I went to New York a while ago and I was doing a dinner. I rang the chef up, we had a bit of a chat and we understood each other. His job was to make sure I was sweet and he had me and made me look good. Then if he comes back and needs something from me, I've got him. I have had a couple of instances when I have gone and done jobs and they have ballsed it up. Theyve said they can make it happen, but I get there and they haven't. I am choosy about the people I work with. If you feel the slightest amount of doubt, bring all your own food, bring your own guys. Don't take any risks with it. If I am doing a function somewhere like Marvel Stadium, I will go and count everything. If there are 200 people, 20 portions per tray, you count 10 trays. I count all the plates. Its not their name on it. If its not right, its me with egg on my face, so I just take those precautions. Trust is good, control is better. Especially if your name is on the line. If you get down to the last 20 people and theres not enough food, then you look like a tool.

I guess that's the whole idea of mise en place. I spoke to Scott Pickett once about how mise en place is really a rule for life, it's all about preparation and once you have everything in place, you can go for it.

That's what it is. You have to be meticulous with that, have it all in place and have it all sorted out. Scottie is great with that. He worked here for a little bit. I know Scottie really well. I love him.

He's great, isnt he? Always the life and soul of the party. Speaking of parties, are you having a party here for your 25 year anniversary?

We are having a party here on a Thursday, night, I believe. I am shocking with parties. We talked about it six months ago and got it all in place. I cant organise my own parties. Ive written a menu and Ive told the guys the food I want, but I can't organise it. They've looked after it all.

Who is coming?

Lots of people. 150, I believe. There are a couple of people I have asked along, like my mum. Pro tip, always invite your mum. The guys have looked after everything for me and they will do a great job and Ill get up and talk, but I just don't like organising parties for myself. I dont do birthdays, its just not my thing. I like to be quiet and just with myself and the boys.

Just to finish with, you mentioned before that chefs should work in a variety of different places and situations, what other advice do you have for young chefs?

If you really want to do well, you have to work hard and work extra hours. I look it like university. Kids go to university, and they put in hours studying. The more hours you put in studying and that might mean working in different venues, but the more of that you do, you build your skill base and the better you are going to be. Move around for two years, work in different venues until you find your feet. Build up your skills, build up your ability to do everything. You might not be an expert at it, but one day you will be. Uniform: always pristine, everything ironed. Never look sloppy. Knives: you might not be able to afford great knives but keep them sharp and keep them clean. Always be on time. If there are any issues, speak to people straightaway. if there is something going on, go to your chef. If you don't get resolution from your chef, go to your manager, but deal with things straightaway. Always conduct yourself like it's your business and always be professional. Those people stand out. Every now and then you get those people through, guys or girls and I see them. They are going to be really good, and I will look after someone like that because they are going to stand out.

It is my trade; it has been in my family for generations. My uncles were chefs, my grandfather was a chef, and his father was a baker as well. It goes down four generations in my family. Thats why I take it very seriously. I take all my apprentices' school work seriously. I'll harass them if they miss a class and if they are not getting good marks. If you work for me, thats what I expect. I think for the young ones getting into it, if youre going to do it, be the best. Be the best and do your best at all times and you will come out of it well. If you are half-arsed about it, you will end up doing something else. Very few people come out of their apprenticeship and go on into their 40s and 50s, but if you work hard and do your best, you'll make good money and you will really enjoy it.

La Luna Bistro, 320 Rathdowne Street, Carlton