Matt Forbes

Hi Matt, it’s so nice to talk to you. We’re in Yarraville, which was your first location and where the production side of Cobb Lane happens.

Correct. This is our headquarters and where we do all of our production.

It feels pretty big because I entered across the road. What goes on over there as opposed to over here?

Across the road is the production facility, where everything is made: basically the bread, the pastries, all the cakes and cookies, that all happens across the road. And then on this side, it’s a warehouse, the storage of pallets of flour and sugar and nuts and things like that and the office as well.

How much flour do you go through in a week?

We’re currently going through about 7 to 8 tonnes. To think, we went from buying a 25 kilo bag to see me through a week, to 13 years later, it’s seven or eight tonnes. It’s really cool.

That’s a lot of bread. and pastries. You have four locations, and you’ve just opened in the CBD.

Yes, 6 weeks ago.

How’s that going?

Great. It’s so good. It’s so busy and the vibe in the city, especially up at that little pocket near Wesley Place is just amazing. We’re loving it.

Well, I’m sure everyone in the city is loving having you there as well. Do people buy differently in the city or is it the same?

Pretty similar. The CBD shop is the only shop where we do coffee in as well. So that is obviously a massive difference to the rest of our locations. We get quite a big lunch trade: lots of sandwiches, lots of pies, which we don’t really get in our other shops either. It’s pretty similar, just really busy.

Why now for a city venue?

It wasn’t really a conscious decision. The opportunity was presented to us about 18 months ago. We mulled over it for a while. We spent a lot of time in the city just in the area watching people and getting a feel for the for the location and it just felt right. The building itself is beautiful. The shop that we’re in has a heritage protected façade, old brickwork. All the bricks were taken down and cleaned and put back in place. The front looks beautiful. The building’s awesome, and the whole area’s really cool.

Tell me about your product. You’re known for your 36 hour sourdough. And also doughnuts and peanut butter cookies.

We actually stopped doing the doughnuts. That was our first thing that really put us on the map. But over time, they’ve just fallen off as has the whole doughnut craze. That was a two or three year period, and then it died down. W made the decision about six months ago to stop doing the doughnuts and concentrate on what we do best. But they were a huge part of our business for a long time. We’ve got the carrot cakes, peanut butter cookies. They’re two of our biggest sellers. And then the breads, which is one of my favourite things to do. I wouldn’t call myself a baker, but it’s definitely one of my favourite things to make. Pastries are huge for us: all your classics; croissants, pain au chocolat and almond croissants.

What does the day look like for you? We just said off mic that you’ve been up since half past one.

My day changes depending on what is going on and how busy we are, if there are any events on. The weekend just gone, we spent trying to catch up on things. We were doing quite a huge amount of production. Today was the last day of that huge production. Tomorrow we’re to normal. So, I might take a day off tomorrow. But it usually starts anywhere between midnight and 4am and generally involves laminating pastry, shaping pastries, working with the team, making sure that all the other jobs are done, custards and cakes and cookies. That generally sees me through till midday, and then if I get some time, I’ll do a bit of paperwork, do a bit of rostering and that’s about it. Pretty boring.

We often have a romantic idea of bakers that they’re kneading the bread in the early hours. Yeah, it’s not that romantic. Not when you’re the one doing it. Sometimes people will do a sidestep out of restaurant cooking perhaps because they want a break, or to do something a little less fast paced, but that’s not what you’ve done. It was a really intentional decision because you saw that there was a need for a better quality of pastries in cafes.

It started with cakes and cookies. At the time, 14 years ago, there wasn’t a huge offering, and a lot of it was the same and it was kind of average for the best part. The goal was to produce something better.

When you grow from a small-scale production into something larger, how do you keep that hands-on small-scale feel, even though it’s now tonnes of flour?

A lot of what we do is still handmade, so we employ a lot of people. The passing on of skills and knowledge is really important to us here, so it’s a case of doing the same thing, but just making lots of it. A massive part of our day is managing people and training people and making sure that everything’s coming out to the standard that we expect ourselves and our customers expect of us as well.

A lot of what we do is still handmade, so we employ a lot of people. The passing on of skills and knowledge is really important to us here, so it’s a case of doing the same thing, but just making lots of it. A massive part of our day is managing people and training people and making sure that everything’s coming out to the standard that we expect ourselves and that our customers expect of us as well.

Matt Forbes, Cobb Lane

When you launch something new and there’s already people doing, you know, cakes and donuts and cookies and things. How do you, how do you get known? Like, what do you? What were those, what was the 1st few months like?

Looking back at it, I do cringe quite a lot. I don’t like to inflate myself, I am not that big, huge character. There was a lot of self-publicity. I’d come from a job where I wasn’t in charge. I wasn’t the name above the door. I was just a sous chef, a part of the kitchen. So building a name for myself, building a brand was hard. There was a lot of talking with influencers and doing quite cheesy things, in my opinion, which, at the time was necessary, but it’s definitely not something I’d normally do.

I guess once you build your brand and you are so well known, it must get easier with each location.

It does, and it doesn’t. A lot of work goes into it. There’s a lot of planning and organising. There’s still a lot that you have to do.

I live in Port Melbourne, I go to the South Melbourne market quite often, so it’s really, it’s really good that you’re there. When you’re thinking about a new location, obviously, the CBD one’s a little bit different, but, Richmond and South Melbourne. Is it because a location opens up, or you think iyour style of product would go well in those areas?

Both Richmond and South Melbourne came about during COVID. We went into COVID not having any retail locations whatsoever. We were just doing wholesale and at that point, we realised that just doing wholesale was not a smart move. Amy and I sat down and we thought about what we wanted to do and how we wanted to do it. We decided we had to be smart about where we chose to go and smart about what we offered. We decided we wouldn’t be doing table service. We wouldn’t do coffee, we’d just do solely retail, so it would be a grab and go situation. Richmond was the first one for us, and it worked really well, and then South Melbourne came along at a very similar time, so we did the two projects together, with the same concept, and they both worked really well. We didn’t particularly go out and say, let’s do something in Richmond, and let’s do something in South Melbourne. Two opportunities came along at the same time.

It just seems really natural now that they’re there. They seem like the perfect neighbourhoods. South Melbourne market’s amazing.

It’s such a cool spot. It’s such an awesome market. It’s my personal favourite market in Melbourne. Obviously, I’m a little bit biased. But it’s the quality of produce there and the amount of stores and all the offerings.

I try and cycle down because it’s quite hard to get a car park around there on Saturdays, particularly. Then I always buy too much and have to ring my partner to come down with another backpack and to help me get it all back. I try and limit my visits because it’s easy to spend a lot of money there, because it’s all such good produce. I love seeing all the people at the market eating all the seafood. I feel like every stall is so well visited and well appreciated.

A lot of the store holders have been there for years and years and they get the same people coming back every single week. It’s the same for us. We get the same people back every single week. It’s a really nice community.

It feels European, because you’ve got the restaurants around the outside, as well. It’s a whole day out at the market and then having your lunch and your wine. It’s very French to me.

Yes and as you said, with the seafood and the cheese and delis, you can stand in the middle at the high tables and eat your oysters and your sushi and sashimi.

You mentioned before that you’re not a baker. What’s the line between baker, pastry chef, and chef? What do those delineations mean to you?

It’s a pretty blurry line in a bakery, between pastry chef and baker. Obviously, in a restaurant it is very different. I generally will do laminated pastries, and that sweet side of things. Whereas bakers are flour and water and a bit of salt. It’s a super physical job, especially with the amount of bread that we’re making and the process that we go through. I’m a bit more of a finicky, finer details person.

You’re often described in articles as a Michelin star chef. How do you receive that? What does that mean for you?

I am most definitely not a Michelin star chef. I spent the first 15, 16 years of my career working in Michelin Star restaurants and fine dining boutique hotels. So from the age of 17, I was working in two or three Michelin star restaurants, which I suppose is why people associate me with that.

It’s a great heading, isn’t it?

Yes, it’s a punchy line. But I’ve never won a Michelin star personally.

Were you drawn to pastry from the start?

No. When I first left school and I went to catering college, I was very much savoury based. I did like doing desserts. It was always a part of it that I enjoyed. The reason I went into pastry is because I did work experience at a restaurant called Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, with Raymond Blanc. I did that when I was still in college, 17 years old. I asked them at the end of it, if there was a job. They said there wasn’t a job in the kitchen, but they did have a job in the pastry department. So, as a foot in the door, I went into the pastry department and then just didn’t look back from there.

It’s quite different, isn’t it? I guess if you’re cooking at that level, savoury would be quite particular as well, everything would have to be consistent and done in the same way, according to the recipe. But I feel like pastry is all about weighing everything precisely and it has to be just right.

Yes, it’s really precise. There’s not much kind of room to move. I think that’s probably what I like the best.

And the creative part of it, because you can be so fanciful with pastry, but you also have to have all that weighing up and being really specific. When you’re creating something new, does it take several attempts, or is it engrained in you now that it’s easier?

Some things can come along pretty quick and quite easy. There are combinations that we work off generally. Then there are things that take longer to pull together. For us, we focus quite heavily on flavour, making sure that it’s punchy. The whole experience has to be right: how it feels when you’re eating it, how much mess it makes. There is a bit of a process. We work off a lot of recipes and ideas that have been evolving over time.

You would have been quite young when you started at catering college: 16 or 17? What drew you to hospitality and being a chef?

If you ask my parents, they’ll tell you about this one specific moment in time when I decided that I wanted to be a chef, which I can’t personally remember. I always just enjoyed cooking. I always enjoyed baking at home and experimenting and if I saw something on the TV, back in those days, it was Gary Rhodes or Brian Turner, one of these TV chefs at the time, if I saw something I liked the look of, I’d often just try it out. I wasn’t smart enough to do anything else, to be honest.

I don’t know why chefs say that, because I couldn’t be a chef. I don’t know how you keep all of the things in your head and there are the dockets coming out and you’re making things happen all at once and once you get higher up, there’s the food costs. There’s so much involved with being a chef. I think it’s our old-fashioned school view that there’s a one kind of smarts, and I think that there’s lots of different kinds of smart.

You’re right. A lot of common sense and initiative is required in the kitchen. You need to be able to react quickly to things that are happening at a million miles an hour.

I think chefs are the best problem solvers in the world.

For that small specific little area of life.

As you say, you have to come up with things, turn things around, or the supplier doesn’t have something, then what are we going to do about that? Look at all these great things that came about because of mistakes, like the myth of Tarte Tatin, where it fell upside down on the floor, and then they just went with it. I love that. When you were still in catering college, you were in a really top restaurant?

In the second year, the top performing students in the college got the opportunity to choose almost any restaurant and the college would try and make it work experience there happen. They already had a relationship with Le Manoir. They had sent people there in the past, so it was pretty easy. At the time, I’d not really heard about it. I didn’t really know much about it at all. But once I got there, it was amazing. That’s where the real passion started. There is the fairy tale passion, but once you’re in that kitchen and you’re around all of these people, who are all so much more older than you and they’re all working so hard, and they’re all so dedicated to the restaurant and the food and the vision, it’s really captivating.

There must be such a thrill of service and being part of something and then seeing it through to the end. That must be really satisfying.

So exciting and terrifying. Especially at 17 years old and you’ve moved three hours away from home.

It would have been long days then too.

16 to 17 hours a day. From the first couple of days there, I though, this is it.

Were there other people in your year who didn’t make it because that was too much for them?

I would say 95% of them. I don’t think there’s many that I went to college with that’s still in the industry, maybe two or three.

That’s incredible. And you also worked with for Michel Roux?

Yes. At the Waterside Inn. Michel Roux was one of my first food heroes, for obvious reasons. Getting the opportunity to go and work at the Waterside Inn was almost a no-brainer. I actually had a job trial at the Fat Duck and The Waterside Inn within a week of each other. I couldn’t turn down The Waterside Inn. Michel Roux’s books were what I was reading at the time, and that was really forging my way of thinking.

Did it live up to your expectations?

It’s actually quite funny, because when I went there, I actually went into the savoury kitchen. Because I wanted to give it a go. Maybe a three Michelin star kitchen wasn’t the right place to do it. It definitely wasn’t the right place to do it. I really struggled, actually. That cemented me as a pastry chef. After two months, I went to Alain Roux, and I said, I can’t work in the kitchen anymore. Can I go into pastry? He said, well, someone’s just left, so there’s an opening. I went into there and within a couple of days I just felt at home. I felt relaxed. I felt comfortable. My hands had started to heal from all the cuts and burns. The first time I ever saw Michel Roux come into the kitchen, and watching him work, is the first time I’ve ever had goosebumps watching somebody work. It was just amazing. Even the age he was at the time in his late 60s.

How often would he do that? Was it because he wanted to still keep in touch with things?

I think we had a special function on, and he came in to give us a quick hand with the pastry. That’s what dreams are made of. This guy was the pinnacle of French, not just pastry work, but French cuisine in the UK. And just the way he moved around the kitchen at that age. You don’t see 20 year olds moving like that. He was just so elegant, smooth, and it was unreal.

Do you think everyone can be a chef?

No. It’s demanding. It’s very physical. You need to be, not just quick on your feet, but quick in your head. There are a lot of problems that need solving within seconds. It’s not for everyone.

No. And then to develop that muscle memory, where you move around the kitchen elegantly, and keep your cool. There’s a lot going on, isn’t it?

Absolutely. Keeping your cool probably comes with age and time. For quite a while I didn’t have a cool head. It’s probably more so since running my own business.

With all of your experiences in mind, and given that you’re doing something slightly different now? What would your advice be to a young person starting out?

Learn the basics. Find a good chef, find a good kitchen to learn the basics, learn the fundamentals. Um… Learn how to draw the most flavour out of produce and take your time. Don’t rush. It’s not a race. Everybody learns and grows at different rates and speeds. Be a sponge, just absorb everything. Watch everyone, pay attention. Be open-minded.

Cobb Lane 1/17-23 Bennetts Lane, CBD

Cobb Lane 1- 3 Taylor Street, Yarraville

Cobb Lane Richmond Traders

Cobb Lane South Melbourne Market