Jose Lorenzo Morales

Hi Jo, how are you? Thanks for reaching out.

Hi Jose. I'm great thank you. It's lovely to get to speak to you. Firstly, congratulations on being the Pacific regional winner of the S.Pellegrino Young Chef 2019 award, that's amazing.

Thank you kindly. I wasn't able to travel for it, unfortunately but I am very happy about what is going on.

What a shame you couldn't be in Milan, but tomorrow night when you go online, are you plating it up as part of the competition?

They are giving me the opportunity to showcase the dish that I worked on for two years and I am very excited to show it.

This dish, there's a lot going on it. You've called it Analogy. Can you talk me through it? What was the brief when you enter this competition? What are they looking or and where do you start?

It's one dish to be presented to the judges and its judged on various factors such as culture; the expression of diversity through the plate, are you observing sustainability? It encourages people to be more socially aware of what is going on. That's it and then we show it to the world.

How did you come up with the idea for your dish, Analogy?

I recently got here, to Melbourne, three years ago. I was working in a restaurant called Lm with a chef called John Rivera. He won the competition the year before me.

I've met John Rivera. Hes amazing.

He is amazing. He is actually doing a new business in ice cream now, making lots of flavours of ice cream. From there, I saw how he ran his system in the kitchen and I was really inspired. He started talking to me about San Pellegrino. Coming from the Philippines I wanted to put a spotlight on my heritage. I wanted people to recognise what real Filipino food is. So I asked him whether he would be interested entering me and we started training and having lots of exposure around Melbourne. Everyone says it is diverse here and I was inspired by that thought. I picked up all the execution and traditional practices that I could and firing it into one plate and that is pretty much what happened.

It looks delicious. So it has pork belly but it's a particular kind of pork belly, young pork.

Yes. There are actually three main elements to it; the young pork from Ballarat from Western Plains. They are very good pork producers. I have been working with them for three years now. They continue to move forward in how they can be more sustainable in their business. I dry aged the pork and it is marinated in flavours inspired by what I saw in Melbourne with some backbone flavours coming from where I was born. Then you have coconut. That is pretty much the most nostalgic ingredient to me; it's my favourite. There are a lot of ages of coconut, from the seventh week to the fourteenth week. What I did was to use all the ages in the plate, so that these variations underlined my culture. Then rice. Rice is a very religious ingredient throughout Asia. Where I was born there are pretty much twelve regions and you would be surprised at how much diversity you would see in the application of how they use rice. Some would turn it into vinegar, some would use it as a coffee, some would use it as a source of carbohydrates or ferment it. I showcased everything I could that would still make sense in the plate. There you have it.

Wow.

It's very overwhelming but I wanted to tell you everything.

I've got a photo of you in great concentration plating it up and it is beautifully plated up as well. How long does it take from start to finish to produce this?

Three and a half hours. I sacrificed a lot of time and practice to that dish. I would do it three times a week even before I started applying for it. It felt good, honestly. It was probably the best part of being in this competition. That and the dedication and discipline, believing in yourself that you can be better each day. Seeing what happened was probably the best part of this experience.

Absolutely. I guess that's what these kinds of things are intended for, especially when it is a young chef of the year award. They are designed to provide you with a mentor and something to rise to, isn't that right?

Yes that's correct.

But you sound as though you are already a star because you have worked with John Rivera and in the States you worked with an incredible chef as well, Curtis Duffy. Where did it all begin for you? Did you always know you wanted to be a chef? What was your pathway?

I actually wanted to be a flight attendant so that I could travel the world. Eventually I had no choice because at that time in college, the entry was full, and I had to choose a culinary course. I started working in hotels part time in Chicago. Eventually some people encouraged me to check out three Michelin star restaurants to start out my career so that I could have the edge and do the things the best way I could. I took the opportunity and dined in the restaurant. At the end, he came over and spoke to me and I started tearing up because I was inspired by the whole experience. It was very overwhelming. He offered for me to go and work with them and it was a real honour. And that's what happened. I went to Mt. Olympus and I saw the best things in the world. And here I am.

I haven't seen the full documentary about Curtis Duffy but I have seen the trailer and it sounds as though he is a very self-aware man and has been through some challenges in his own life but has a really great sense of drive. The restaurants that he runs look incredible. What an amazing experience to learn from him.

Yes his moral values are impressive and he is very disciplined. If you connect with his moral values, things are going to change for you in one snap of a finger.

Where did you start in his kitchen?

I started in the larder section, pretty much assembling all the starters and having a good idea about the synergy of how he can run the restaurant. I started from there.

That was seven years ago, is that right?

Yes.

Was this your first job out of training?

This was my second job. It was pretty hard for me because having been trained in a basic fundamental manner and then shifting towards a high level fine dining experience was pretty overwhelming. Thats how everything snapped for me and I started thinking about everything and how I can do things in the best way. From there, my apprenticeship finished and I headed home back to the Philippines. I was trying to look for the best restaurant in the Philippines and I found Toyo Eatery which was on the 50 Best list. It has an award of 'one to watch' in Asia, so it was a good opportunity for me. I learned more about my heritage and what are the best ingredients I can get, the seasonality. I stayed there for two years and then I moved to Melbourne.

And did you come to Melbourne because of its reputation for food?

Yes my friend recommended that I come here. With my Visa, it is pretty challenging to get to Europe and I was thinking about my best options. I found Melbourne and saw all the hat restaurants and a lot of the cookbooks I have reference chefs from here. I started off at Press Club and then I went to Lm and then I was at Gaea, which is the best new restaurant right now.

How amazing is Mo Zhou?

He is totally amazing. He changes his menu by the month and it is insane.

Some of the things he does, like wandering out and discovering that the new tender pine needles are really delicious and then making butter from them. Wow.

I started loving pine needles because of him.

He is such a lovely man and that is a great restaurant. Gosh, you have worked in some lovely places. Youre at Omnia now?

Yes, I am under chef Stephen Nairn and his experience and his love for food is very inspirational.

You are working in all these top restaurants with excellent reputations. Do you feel stressed, is it a pressure for you in service or is it exciting and an adrenaline rush? What's happening for you during service?

It's a bit of both worlds. It's a bit stressful but I already accepted that when I began this journey. The pressure is what keeps me alive. I am learning a lot and having all these lessons taught to me day by day and having to execute these things every day so that I can grow and build my own perspective. That's my main plan.

Obviously you are getting inspiration from the people you are working with and you saidhave cookbooks, but are you also looking online? Where are you getting inspiration?

Pretty much my references would be my cookbooks. I love cookbooks, it's my hobby to collect everything I can. At the same time I engage with research online to find out as much as I can. I like to learn more about native ingredients and bush tucker and products.

It's interesting to me because you sound so passionate and as though you were born to be a chef but that wasn't your first choice, are you really pleased now with the path you took?

Of course. I have no regrets at all. I am very happy with where I am and I embrace it. If there was only one thing I could do, it would be cooking.

It's lovely for me to get to talk to people who are so passionate about what they do. I get such a thrill for myself when I hear how much you love what you do. I think that must be conveyed through the food to the people who are eating it.

It is true. Pretty much my food is an expression of myself, my character and what I believe in. Thats what I tried to put on my plate for the competition. Every lesson I learned and connected with, I integrated into my dish. Thats why I called it Analogy, because having all these overwhelming elements and practices and traditions, flavours and textures all work because they stimulate the palate. The analogy would be, imagine if humanity did the same thing. What if we were all to accept our differences. I think this is the strongest and best practice we can do so we can move further.

I love that Jose. It's beautiful.

I love expressing my thoughts through analogy. It is my best way of explaining things.

What do you have to do between now and going online and producing Analogy again?

I am doing my prep now. It is really emotional to be honest to have reproduced it so many times over the years and this will probably be the last time I make it and then I will go back to work. I want to see all the things I have worked hard for and I get to show it to the world.