I wrote about Vex for Broadsheet a few weeks ago and was keen to catch up with Florian Ribul again to hear more. He made me a coffee and we sat outside in the courtyard beneath the huge lemon tree. The way Flo talks about cooking and his life as a chef is captivating, and I could have easily listened for hours. But since opening a couple of months ago, Vex has garnered such a following that Flo and co-owners Rory Kennedy and Owen Probert have a big day ahead weaving their Vex magic, and I was keen to get home so I could write up the glorious conversation to share with you.
Hi Flo. Thanks for talking to me again today. I have spoken to you a lot already because I wrote the article for Broadsheet and I had so many questions and thank you for being so patient with me.
No problem. I felt as though I was co-writing.
You really were. I did quote you a lot, for example, Vex being one letter off sex.
Yes. I've been using that a lot these days.
Good, so you were happy with that?
Definitely. People were surprised that it even came out because I had always joked about saying it and every time I say it, the guys have a little giggle in the background but I'm just going with it now.
I was really pleased that it made it through the editing.
We were actually just written about in Monocle as well and I said the same thing to their writer and he said he didn't know if it would fly with the editors and it didn't end up going in.
Go Broadsheet. How long has Vex been going now?
We have just finished our second month of operating and we have been in the space now for five months. We were waiting and taking our time and trying to predict things. It has been good so far.
When I spoke to you initially, you had to limit numbers but are you now at full capacity?
No, not yet, we still have some limitations in place, but we are really fortunate that we put a working model together that I suppose was a little bit experimental, but in essence is pretty old school. It was that whole notion of running a tight team and everyone has to jump onto doing whatever needs to be done at that moment. That got us through the restrictions, then being unexpectedly busier than we thought we were going to be, really on edge. But at the same time, that's what we wanted to be. We didn't want to overstaff or make things easier on ourselves. It's much more important that we got a good idea of how to run this space. So being able to do that through restrictions and then the light loosening of it was good.
You're working with friends too.
Yeah, now we like to joke about whether we are still friendswe are, we definitely are. It has been really good. Above all things, friendships are friendships, but we have a lot of professional respect for one another which partially pre-dates that and partially overlaps that and so far it is going really nicely.
I have to sayand I always feel in two minds about fact-checking for articles because if someone tells me they worked somewhere, I just want to believe that, but in fact checking, Almay (Jordaan) and Luke (Bresnan, Little Andorra) both said how much they loved working with you and I loved that because I spoke to Almay for Conversation with a chef and she is so lovely and so incredible at what she does and I could tell from what I saw that you are as well, and it's always nice to hear lovely things about people and everyone said that about all of you.
That's great. I think good people attract good people, and sometimes that doesn't work out but the people you've worked with remain good people, and you're good people, it's nice to breed a little community here in Melbourne where that's happening a fair bit. Working with Almay was great; Neighbourhood was an awesome experience and obviously those guys are kicking huge goals. It's immensely impressive. You'll hear the same thing from Owen who was at Marion, which is a monster and is doing great things and some of the other people we have worked for. We've been really fortunate.
Little Andorra looks like a great place as well.
It is. Totally understated and under-rated. Luke is awesome. It doesn't really matter who is there, it's always a good time and they always have interesting wine.
Where did it all start for you? What made you become a chef?
Ahfailing at Art School, for the most part.
One door closes
Basically, I had to start paying some bills and hospitality was a quick in. I went from pouring pints in a pub to being a waiter in the bistro next to it and eventually seeing that the kitchen was having a lot more fun and for me it was that bridge between a craft, a trade and a bit of an artistic pursuit at the same time.
Where was that?
I started out in Perth, so pub life for a little bit before deciding to get more serious about it and find some restaurant work, which slowly developed into doing my apprenticeship over there. Then I packed my bags and headed off to Austria and then London.
You have family in Austria?
Basically my entire family is Austrian, just my little family module has been moving since I was born.
So, Perth to Austria and you were working over there?
Yes, I went and stayed with my aunt and uncle in this tiny little village and there was a new up-and-coming chef there who had got a couple of hats in his first year in a tiny little fine diner that was only open three nights a week and was part of a small family-run hotel. That was amazing. It was in the base of a valley and we would go foraging a lot in the forest, just up the slopes and I got to meet a lot of local producers. It was hyper seasonal and fun.
It sounds as though the restaurant was small but had a really good name, was it really busy?
It was as busy as it could be because it was essentially two or three people in the kitchen running a place and trying to do 14 courses for maybe a maximum of 25 people a night.
Was that European, rather than Austrian food?
I think the Austrian fine dining scene was largely French influenced anyway but he was using purely produce from his little region, so he had no option but to kick in a fair bit of Austrian. That's where a lot of my inspiration comes from these days. It kinda started happening; I never thought I'd start cooking more Germanic Austrian food, but it just happened.
I was on exchange in Germany a very long time ago in Lubeck and my recollection of the food centres around Wurst, Kaffee und Kuchen, but I don't really remember it being great food, but that was a long time ago.
Look, to be fair, I don't think that in a lot of areas it is particularly inspiring; it's your pretty straight down the barrel stuff; your sausages and mustard and horseradish and bread. But I think around the cities and so on and smaller communities where there's a bit of farming happening, there is some really delicious stuff. There are some unique processes. We're about to start recipe testing some stuff that I hadn't seen anywhere else before except for in this one tiny part I happened to be working, so there will be some more Austrian things coming on because of it.
That's the beauty of many European countries; they are very regional in their food and they do only do certain things in that region. It's incredible. It's like if I was to be properly seasonal like you chefs are and only eating or cooking certain foods in their season, then it's really incredible at that time and then you wait the whole year, so when you go to that town and have that particular thing, it brings a specialness to it.
It's a very hard one. I particularly love good produce that is well grown and in season and it just means that there are probably only two months of the year when I can bear eating tomatoes and for the rest of it, I just can't deal with it. It's been ruined for me by learning what that means. It doesn't work for me anymore.
I want to be like that. I want to be really discerning and instead, I just think, oh tomatoes, I'll have them
Well, I say that, but I have two children, so at the end of the day we buy whatever they want.
I was following a really great thread on Instagram from Nicola Dusi at The Hardware Club and trying to get his child to eat meals and showing pictures of what they actually ate as opposed to his intention as a chef of what they might eat. It must be challenging.
Absolutely. I had a moment of pride when Emile had his first oyster. He's into it now and I can't wait to take him oyster eating. Kids can surprise you; he's a pickle fiend.
It starts off with produce, but I don’t conceptualise dishes too much. In the kitchen here with Rory and Owen, everything we do, we do it together. When the produce comes in, we have a look at it and taste of it and start having discussions around it. Everybody has a different reference point, so whatever I think about something, the other two might have different ideas. It’s always going to be like that and at the end of the day, food is everything.
How long were you in Austria?
Only for a year.
And then to London. Where did you work in London?
I was in a place called The Clove Club which was an up-and-coming fine diner at the time and which has done some really big stuff. It was a real eye opener as to what real fine dining kitchens are like.
In terms of hierarchy?
Yeah, a bit of hierarchy, a bit of British fine dining attitude.
A bit shouty?
It wasn't the shoutiest kitchen, I don't think, but there was a bit of quiet aggression floating through there. It was the kind of place where you don't leave your tea towel lying around because it will just disappear behind you; there were little bits and pieces you learn along the way. A lot of long hours but definitely if you're young enough and can deal with it and I think that exists less and less these days especially in Australia, but it definitely forms you into learning how much you can do in 15 minutes and working much more cleanly and better organised that you ever thought you could. It definitely pushes your limits.
Older chefs talk about the discipline of the kitchen and how it can instil that into you and it can have its place, perhaps. I don't know, as you say, it has its place less and less, because, yes you need to be disciplined, but there's possibly another way to get there.
Absolutely. I totally agree. There's a reason why I left that and didn't want to go back to that sort of system. I think those kind of places will probably always exist but I think they are becoming less brutal than they were. Having said that. I haven't been around that for a fair while. But I totally agree; I think you go through those experiences to figure out whether or not you're going to be that kind of person or if you are going to actively seek to not be that kind of person. It was very clear that I did not want to be in a type of environment where you felt like certain notions of brutality were going to get the best out of people because I don't think it does. I think that's just ruling with fear. I did a stage in Austria at another fine diner and it was the first time I had felt as though I was in an actual military system. There was someone barking up the front and people jumping to and I had never seen that kind of attention before.
I wonder what that does and I know people go there and they dine in these places and the food is beautiful and people have a really good experience but I just have this woo-woo idea that the energy of the people making the food can go into the food and I would rather that food was being made in a more loving and collegial environment.
That's exactly it. There are a lot of closed kitchens for a very good reason. You're probably not seeing a lot of smiles coming out. That's fine, maybe you can call it focus, but I think of all things if you can't enjoy your work and I mean genuinely enjoy it and be excited to go there and be part of something that is exciting, because you are scared about making the next mistake, it doesn't really further your skills either; you're not really getting a chance to brin the best out of yourself and surprise yourself very often. It is very closed and one track.
I felt like a lot of the stuff I learned in London, I probably did not execute that anywhere near as well as I did once I took it out of that context and started working with it in a more relaxed environment. Doing a lot of the stuff I learned there, I really only started getting to grips with it properly well after.
That's really interesting and it's not the same at all, but for me learning French for so many years at school and even being in France, it wasn't until I came back and had to teach it and grew to love it more that it really flowed for me. I'm making up analogies now
I think it's generally how I ended up being with cooking. I knew I loved it and had a massive interest and immersed myself in it, but I think I sucked for a long long time. I am very happy to admit that and if you talk to Rory, co-chef and owner, he was sous chef when I was apprentice. We formed our friendship initially in a kitchen where he was my senior although we were the same age, and he will tell you 100 stories of how awful I was. I was a truly awful apprentice for a long while there. I could not get my shit together.
Something has to click, doesn't it?
Yes, I think it eventually does and for me, it was nerves and a lot of compounding pressure on myself, which I am very good at and coming to terms with better with age. It's learning to relax a little bit. Once you start realising you're not completely useless, it does start to flow a bit better.
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I think it does come with age. People often talk about imposter syndrome; that feeling that someone is going to find out I'm not that good at it and then you step over that and say to yourself, actually I am good at this and I'm just going to do it.
Pretty much. Caring less about what people think helps as well.
How does that work in Melbourne where there are a lot of other restaurants, everyone's a critic and everyone can write about food and have an opinion? Do you read what's written about you?
We keep an eye on it.
Well for you, its all good, of course.
We're fortunate firstly in that Rory, myself and Owen, none of us are particularly big industry insiders. We don't really move in very big hospo circles. There was a little bit of a worry opening a place with the three of us and none of us are massively connected. We definitely have friends in the industry but we're not going around to a lot of venues and playing the Instagram games and all that. When we do read stuff online about what we are doing and most of it has been quite positive, we have to find our own way to deal with that. We've decided to just post Joe Strummer quotes. It doesn't really have anything to do with anything; we're just going to post Joe Strummer quotes because he was never wrong.
Ok, good tactic.
We just hope we get a bit of a laugh when people read it.
I really loved the photos that went with the Broadsheet article that I wrote. That was Kate Shanasy and she takes really great photos and they reminded me of how much I loved the smoked and glazed turnips. Now, ideas like the turnips and smoking them over feijoa wood and what you were doing with the leaves and making the most of everythingthis is such a dumb question, but how do you know how to do all that?
A lot of that comes through passion projects. I got into fermenting for a fair while and I still do it and I think once you've got the basis of a couple of those things, you realise what is going to work well. The smoked and glazed turnips in themselves are already off the menu because they're not very good any more, but that for me is a pretty good representation of who we are, that was a very personality based snack; it's a little bit in your face, a little bit awkward actually and makes you think for a little bit. It's salty sweet sour smoky
And the fact that it's turnips; you don't very often see turnips.
Yes. It was a really awesome snack to start off with because it represents what Vex is. We're going to keep putting things out there that might need a little bit of thought.
What is the turnip on the menu now?
We've changed it into something that's a bit more approachable really. We currently have a tomato dish on that is an anti-tomato dish in a way. I didn't want to put on a tomato dish with a fresh cheese and a herb, I've done it plenty. They're peeled and warmed through the oven, slow-roasted down and served with a caramelised whey sauce and horseradish and linseed crackers. It's a plate of brown and red. It's the least summery tomato dish you've ever seen. But it's super interesting and delicious, I think, and sometimes I just want to put a different perspective on things that people probably have a lot of at this time anyway.
I'm getting more of a sense of the name of Vex now, I see what you're doing.
It's definitely a world away from when I was first writing menus and it was all blood and hearts and livers, still veg focussed, but lots of fats through it. I was throwing a lot of offal at people, which I still love but I have definitely learned to restrain myself.
Well, that brings its own challenges, doesn't it?
Yeah. We write a small menu so that people are bottle-necked into having our way at this point in time. There are still plenty of approachable things on there too.
Do you think about food all the time?
Yes. Mostly. Yeah. I don't know if Ill ever stop. It starts off with produce, but I don't conceptualise dishes too much. In the kitchen here with Rory and Owen, everything we do, we do it together. When the produce comes in, we have a look at it and taste of it and start having discussions around it. Everybody has a different reference point, so whatever I think about something, the other two might have different ideas. It's always going to be like that and at the end of the day, food is everything.
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