Daniel Mastramico

Conversation with a chef: Hi Daniel, it's lovely to meet you and great to be talking about Zero95. I had a colleague who talked to me about the Doncaster store years ago, and he said, "it's so great, it's the best pizza." And then you won an award there.

Daniel Mastramico: The boys won an award back in 2016. It's a little while ago, but they did great. They won the World Pizza Championship and then from that, Doncaster just obviously boomed. Those boys since have moved on, and they're very successful in what they've done. And then that's when Dromana opened and I had the opportunity to join the group. I jumped on board and became the Executive chef for the group.

You've obviously got Italian family heritage too.

We all do. From being a little kid, especially on the farm in Mildura, my grandma would wake me up in the morning and ask me what type of eggs we wanted. We'd go and pick them from the cage and it was fantastic times. I look back on it now and appreciate it because not many kids get to have that opportunity these days to experience things like that.

That is amazing. So that's a real Italian background. Were you born here?

I was born here. Mum and dad came here when they were very young. I still have a grandmother whos with us and she still cooks flat out and prepares sweets for the whole community in Mildura and loves making cakes and sweets.

So, growing up in that environment, did you always think you would be a chef?

No. I didn't at first. I started waitering when I was 15 years old, reception centre work, and I loved front of house, managing bar work, things like that. And then I had a phone call when I was about 19. I had finished school, and I wasn't sure what I was going to do. I was always still in hospitality, but not as a profession. I didn't have a profession. Good friends of mine at Il Cantuccioin Lygon Street had rung my parents up. They were very good family friends. They said, would your son be interested in an apprenticeship? I was already doing the certificate of hospitality on weekends, wine tasting, front of house, silver service, things like that, so I thought I'd give it a go. I just fell in love with it. It was hard work; it was the old days of four year apprenticeships and things like that. I just took off from there. I did my apprenticeship there. They were great people to work for.

What did you love about it? Was it, like, the actual making? Was it, um, the thrill of service? Was it the discipline?

This one was good because I worked under a few different chefs who had their own way of doing things. Adapting to the different types of chefs was fun because you'd pick out the best points in all of them and create your own personality with it. The busy-ness of the restaurant was hectic at times because it was so busy back in the day in Lygon Street, and it was just action all the time. We were very busy, and as an apprentice, you were trained to deal with pressures of everyday working here.

Where'd you go after that?

From there, I went to a place in Toorak, which was a popular place back in the day for a lot of celebrities, people of that type of calibre. And then from there, I travelled, I went overseas. I worked in Genoa in a 5-star restaurant called Zeffirino, and it was eye opening, just to see the way they prepared food, the way the brigade worked in the kitchen. It was very educational, and I was there for about a year.

Had you been back with family to Italy?

No. That was my first time I went. There was a chef at the time called Gianpaolo, who was very popular as far as presenting pesto to the pope and those sorts of people. I worked at his restaurant because he would come to Melbourne to do special events at the time, this is going back probably to 1997. That that was the type of place it was. It was a well-known restaurant, family operated. It was quite entertaining. We would do some functions on the side and there was me and another chef, Hugo Diaz, who was an apprentice, and we were in charge of the buffet line at the aquarium in Genova, and it was just a just a treat. It was a good experience.

I just got back from 6 weeks in Europe, which is very lucky. And I went to Cinque Terre, and we did a pesto making course. The guy there said that's where it comes from, Genoa, and the basil all came from there. He had all his different secrets for making it. It was quite a process to do it his way. We were there for ages, but with some Aperol Spritz to help.

It's funny you said that because I learned there. I did the recipes there, tried to implement them here, and they're just different flavours. You can't have that same flavour. That's what makes Genoa or the pesto from there so interesting because the flavours are different.

I've spoken to a few people lately, and we've all been lamenting the lack of flavour in our produce. We do big and beautiful tomatoes or basil or coriander or whatever it is, but there's no flavour there and you have to do quite a lot to it to bring out that flavour.

You do. That's why everything's so simple there. Because it's picked that day and it's eaten the same day, and it doesn't sit in our fridge or on the shelf for a week before we use it. That's what I realised even last year when I went back to Italy, we would shop in the morning and eat that day or night, and it was just the freshness. You couldn't compare to here.

I wonder if it's our soil as well. I just think because tomatoes in some of those places are so delicious. Here, there is no flavour.

Plus, whatever pesticides they use, and they're put in cold storage for a long time too, like apples. They're in cold storage for months by the time it goes to the consumer. So there's the difference.

But as a restaurant, do you have access to better produce than we do?

We do. You have to go sourcing, and obviously, you have to pay premium prices. It's hard to have that balance sometimes, with the economy the way it is at the moment, having the best produce without charging the right figure for it. And we are a family restaurant, so we try and keep to a standard where people can afford to come in with families on a frequent basis.

What did you do after that year?

I was there for just over a year and a half, I think. I did travel. I went to Canada as well. I did some cooking. I was lucky enough to do some cooking demonstrations over there. I was north of Toronto in a place called Sudbury. Ive got some family there, one of my cousins was a teacher at the time, so I did some cooking classes for the colleges there, which was an experience in itself. And from there I did some time in Hong Kong. I studied at the Hyatt there, great chocolate work. They were fantastic. At the time, they won best hotel 2 years running, I think.

Quite different working in a hotel to working in a restaurant.

The hotel was more for studying and just seeing how they operate and just to educate myself. So that was a great opportunity to have and then obviously, coming back to Melbourne after all this. I kiss the ground every time I did come back. I love Melbourne. We don't realise how lucky we are. It's great being on a holiday and enjoying yourself, but coming back, it's nice. I came back and I was ready to start chefing again. I worked in a place called Il Duca in Wellington Parade. I'd always help out there even when I was a young apprentice on my days off from Lygon Street, I would go help them on my days off just to gain more experience. So I went to work for Luciano. That was a great place, to work at too. They're still operating now with different owners. Luciano retired. God bless him. Then I met Dominic, my partner here in Zero95. I helped him open up his restaurant, Italian Society in the city for with DiMattina group as well. My good friend, Joe, who's another great chef, we opened that venue together. I've moved around a little. I worked with a family owned the restaurant in Point Cook in suburbia. I went and helped them out there too. In the interim, I've helped people open restaurants. It seems to be my thing at the moment, helping people open restaurants. I've opened probably 10 so far, as far as helping design and get the restaurants operating.

Well, certainly, you've been in those different places. You would have a really good idea about what sort of design works. I guess it's about flow.

It is. Of course. Even if you can the see the way this is designed, it's all about the flow. We'll have our designers come and design a great looking restaurant, but it's not practical. So then we're going to reassess, reshuffle everything, and then do what's best for the customer. We want the food to go out the way it should be as far as the quality is concerned as well as it all coming out together. That's important when it comes to design.

And you were saying before that you miss being in the kitchen. So, although you're opening restaurants and you've got that sort of owner hat as well, how often are you on the pans?

I still I still get on the pans. Sometimes I feel like getting my phone and throwing it in the bin and just getting on the pans because that's my safe space. That's where I like to create and get excited about the flavours, watching the customer's reactions when I'm cooking. For me, that's very rewarding. And that's what's keeping me going after 30 years, I suppose.

It's so good. I love hearing that because it's a really hard profession, and I think particularly as we were saying in this day and age, with all the challenges that are about.

That's right. Every year, I think to myself, God, I've got to get out of this. What else is there? And then I grab my old cookbooks, from mentor chefs that I had in the past, and I'll get them out and spend a few days researching, and then I just get creative again. And you need that inspiration. We say in Italian, pasioni masione: passion and inspiration. That's what keeps you going. That's what I feel. That's what happens to me.

Zero95 has several restaurants, does each restaurant have a different menu depending on where it is, or do you stick to the same thing?

With the Zero95 dining group, we have the we have the same menu in all venues. That way we have consistency. And the training that we give the chefs is of the standard that we're after for the group.

What kind of pizza is it?

Good question. Back in the day when they won the world championship in Doncaster, it was more than Napoletana style pizza, fluffy, light. When we opened the Dromana store, we seemed to have a bit of a problem because the people up that way weren't used to that style pizza. So we combined them both. Instead of a classic or a Napoletana style, we met in between. That seems to be the way everyone's happy and where the pizza's more consistent, and the average consumer is happy to have that pizza.

You don't have to tell me the secret, but what's the secret to that style of pizza to get it perfect?

Magic hands. It's like anything, you can have the perfect recipe. But it it's also the people making it. It's the love that goes into it. It's very important to keep a close eye as well, and that's my position here, keeping an eye on the way things are made and the consistency and everything. Sometimes the pizza chefs have a great idea and we execute it. It's all about improving, there's never wrong or right. It's about improving recipes. Pizza can be very technical as far as the dough, the fermentation, the topping, I won't go too much into that side of thing, it's never ending. The more you look into it, the more technical it can be.

How many different toppings do you have?

I would say white bases; there's probably about 8 pizzas and there would be a good10 classic red style pizzas. Keeps us busy.

I bet it does.

Do you have to go around all stores?

I do go in between them all, and there'll be more now that this one's opening, just to have that consistency and to have a rapport with the chefs. I like working with them, not just telling them what to do all the time. Because once you're in there, you gain that respect and camaraderie and that team environment.

Drinks wise, because you've got that bar area, does it tend more towards a more Italian style?

In Dromana, we went away from the Italian varieties, and went more local being the Peninsula because they have some great varieties. And then we're implementing that across the board even in the menus of the other stores. For the beers, we go the Italian style. And the cocktails, they're open slather, a bit of everyone's favourites. And then we might create some specials that might have an Italian influence or some type of different Spritzes that we might do on a regular basis.

I really got into that habit of, especially in Cinque Terre, I got into the habit of aperitivo with snacks. Every time you sit down for your Aperol spritz, a little tray of snacks would come out as well.

That's right. It's just to make you have another Aperol spritz.

Because I needed an excuse to have another one!

Of course you did.

I'm coming to the opening, which I'm really excited about, but just to finish off with, Daniel, because you've had all these different experiences, and given your range of experience, what would your advice be to a young person starting out in the industry?

My advice would be, honestly, if you've got a passion for cooking, give it a go because it's it can be very rewarding. I know there's a lot of stress involved. Times have changed and the older type of generation of chefs have left the industry. So now it's about more the education side and broadening your knowledge and it's never ending. I don't know everything and I never will know everything, But if you're really keen on cooking, give it a go. Because if you've got the passion and the emotion, I think you can go very far in this industry.

Perfect. Thank you.

Zero95 Alphington, The Bend