Pieter Buijsse

This isn't my first time to Bar Carolina, but it's my first time out the back.

It's not as glamorous out here though.

I was interested to see what you're doing because you've been down on the peninsula, which is really amazing, and you were part of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival 30 under 30. Was that 2022?

Yes, 2022.

You don't have a very strong accent.

No. Ive been hanging around all these bogans for too long.

I read that you started in the kitchen at a young age, 12?

Yes. The story I've been telling everyone is that I wanted a new pair of soccer boots and my dad said, look, I bought you a pair last year, how about if you want a new pair, you go and actually work for it. You can make money yourself and buy your own soccer boots. So that's how it started as a kitchen hand in a restaurant near where I grew up, just working in the kitchen and hanging out with the boys. It was interesting. It was really hard work, but I loved it.

Also, 12! Are there not labour laws?

Well, I'm not sure if I should be telling this on the podcast, but I think there is.

I suppose people do paper rounds here.

It was only a couple hours a week. It wasn't a full-time contract at the age of 12.

So that wasn't not Amsterdam, it was the countryside, is that right?

Yes, it was south, near the Belgian border. I grew up pretty much five minutes from the Belgian border.

And did you just keep doing that throughout school?

The schooling system works a little bit different in Holland. So actually at the age of 12, you can choose a profession that you want to do. So you say, I want to become a chef, you can go to culinary school at the age of 12, three days a week. You just do like your Maths, your English, your history and all those kinds of subjects. And then two days a week you actually work in a kitchen cooking for the other students. And then by the time you are 18 years old, you are fully qualified, ready to go into a world and start working as a chef.

Do you think Dutch kids are a lot more mature than Australian and New Zealand children? Because I feel like 12 seems really early to decide what you're going to do.

Oh, kids are kids.

"I want to be an astronaut!" What then?

I think you're very lucky at that age if you already know what you want to do and what you want to become. This was also the era where MasterChef was coming up and everybody saw the chefs on tv, Gordon Ramsay, Jamie Oliver, all these guys were becoming very popular. So the school actually grew enormously in a couple of years time, just from that exposure on television. Which also means that if you actually do start going to culinary school, you realise it's not like it is on telly. There's not one big clock hanging in the kitchen and then you've got one hour and you make one dish and afterwards we all high five and hug each other. It's, here's 20 kilos of onion and start peeling.

So when were you doing that two days a week?

From 12.

From 12? Wow.

That was boarding school as well. So Monday to Friday I would be there and Friday night I would come home, drop my bag with all the laundry off at home, say hi to mum, go to the restaurant, start working Friday night, and then Saturday and Sunday work all day, both days, and then Monday back to school.

Can you remember as your little 12-year-old self? Did you love it? Was it hard?

It was great. It was hard, but that was kind of the charm of it as well. I saw all these 20 something year old guys in the kitchen swearing and yelling at each other and after work having beers and smoking Marlboro Reds. And I thought, oh my God, you guys are so cool. I want to be one of you.

What sort of things were you cooking early on?

I was working as a kitchen hand, mainly at the start. And then just helping out a little bit, washing the salad, peeling the onions. In school, you cook for your other students. So the days where you have theoretical classes, you have a two hour lunch break every day and you go to a restaurant and get a four course meal. Entree, soup, main course and dessert. The other students are cooking that. So then the other days where you are cooking, they're coming to have lunch.

And is your family very culinary?

Not specifically, to be honest. My mum likes cooking, but I growing up, they had their own business. I have an older brother as well, so I think for them it was always rushing around and make sure there's some kind of dinner on the table at six o'clock. There wasn't really any culinary experience there. But I thought, if I'm going to have some kind of a job as a young kid just to make some extra pocket money, you can either go work in the supermarket stocking shelves, and that seemed boring to me or do a paper round, but I thought a kitchen sounds like fun.

Was it a Michelin restaurant?

Yes, it was a two Michelin star restaurant in Holland.

And you were there for a few years?

I worked there for probably about five years. I started off as a kitchen hand, just washing the dishes and then later on you get a little bit more involved washing some salads and peeling the onions and then the more you do, the more you can learn and get to see.

Was it French fine dining or was it Dutch fine dining?

Dutch cuisine is not very renowned. I think Dutch cuisine has a lot of influence from France, especially the Michelin star restaurants in Holland have a very strong French identity. The restaurant that I was at, they specialise a lot in seafood and local produce. A lot of vegetables, not so much meat. Also because the area doesn't have a lot of meat, maybe a little bit of lamb here and there, but not very known for beef or anything like that. And we were right at the water, so it made a lot of sense to have a more seafood based menu. They had a big veggie garden out the back. They grew 50% of their produce in terms of vegetables there as well.

What was the name of that place?

De Kromme Watergang, which is going to be a very nice one to pronounce for everyone.

I'm not going to pronounce it, but I might need help with writing it down!

I can write it down for you.

Yes, you write it down for me. Was it a stressful kitchen or a harmonious kitchen? I guess with two Michelin stars. I imagine there's a pressure.

There's a lot of pressure. It was, I wouldn't say a rough kitchen. It was a nice working environment. Not the horror kitchens from the telly, but there was definitely a pressure there. You had to work hard and you had to work properly, especially in service, head down and do what you need to do.

And so apart from the cool factor of smoking the Marlboro Reds and so on, what was it about that environment that you thought, yes, this is what I want?

For me it's working with the produce, fresh produce; the fishermen that come in with the beautiful catch of the day. I always knew I wanted to do something creative, I suppose, but I'm terrible at drawing. I'm not very creative in anything other than that. But I think food is definitely a way where you can express that creativity and bring that to the table. I think that that's what I like. Especially now when you get to know your suppliers really well, they come to you with their specialties and say, look, I've got amazing asparagus coming up. I've got amazing truffles coming. If you have that great bond with those suppliers and you learn a little bit about their processes and how they grow things or the fishermen, how they catch stuff and how they process their food, that's where most of the joy comes from, I think.

I think you're really lucky when you are a chef in a restaurant because I think you have access to all of those suppliers. I know that we have farmer's markets here, and I guess we can drive out to places and access some of those things. I know I went and visited a heirloom vegetable farm in Romsey and those vegetables are really delicious. But I feel like I've had a lot of conversations with people lately about how vegetables don't really have much flavour. I guess that's buying from supermarkets. I lived in the south of France for a year, and the vegetables there tasted like sunlight, so is what Im saying correct? Ordinary people don't have access to good produce? And how does produce compare here to what you're talking about over there?

I think to your first point, yes. I think a lot of people don't get access to that great produce because they buy from supermarkets and supermarkets buy from whole suppliers who grow things in bulk. If you go to a tomato farm who specialise just in tomatoes, or you go to a fisherman who specifically only looks after this one specific thing, he doesn't buy a hundred different things from everywhere, then you get that specialized item. It's easier for us in a restaurant. Obviously if you're at home, you're not going to go to the tomato farm for your tomato to the potato farm for your potato. You buy it in a one stop shop. So yes, you are lucky in a restaurant where you can experience that from different supplier. I think that the produce is definitely different in Europe, but not necessarily better. I think other things are better here. Say for example, herbs. In Europe, if you taste chervil, it's so strong, so full on, if you have a couple leaves of chervil, it will take over your whole palate. While here in Australia, you take half a bunch of chervil and you put it in a salad, you can't even really taste it. I don't know if it's where they grow it, the terroir, or if it's the processes or the, the products they use with it. I dont know. But then other things are better here than they are in Europe. I suppose that's also where you need to come in from a chef point of view, when you use produce, think about what's local, what's in season, what's well produced, and what am I going to put on a plate.

For me, I think it's that Anthony Bourdain quote where he says, look, we've been spoiled where people eat mediocre strawberries 365 days a year. While if you actually went at strawberry season where they are grown, like Sunny Ridge Farm in Red Hill, they have some of the best strawberries I've ever tasted, even compared to Europe, but they have a very short harvest season, and that's it. So that's when you buy them, that's when you cook with them, and that's when you eat them. But other than that, there's no point for me importing oranges from California and having avocados from all over the world come to your place.

That's right. And that's that global village aspect, isn't it, that we've really ruined things for ourselves by having access to all of these things all year round. Our bodies need certain things that are grown at that time of the year as well, locally, but we've forgotten about all of that and we just want to eat avocados and strawberries all year round. So we are not really getting to have that treat factor as have the absolute beautiful flavour of them.

That's also how I base my menus at the moment. We're coming towards the end of summer, so I specifically look at what's good this time of the year. As soon as the tomatoes are out, they're coming off the menu everywhere. But when it's around, let's use it as much as we can.

What a weird time we're in now. I listen to Triple R, which is a community radio station. Yeah. And Wednesday mornings theres a guy who talks about gardening. He was saying that it has not been a very warm summer. Every else in Australia is one of the hottest summers. But here it hasn't been very warm, except now we've got this really weird thing where we've got cold mornings and extremely hot days. And then cold nights again. So we are straddling two weather systems.

I saw Julian from Navi posting in January that he found his first pine mushroom. That makes no sense. If you've got a nice pine mushroom thats great. Go harvest and put it on the menu, but its very strange on a 40-degree day to have something with mushrooms on it.

Ok, so then you're 17, 18 by the time you get to the end of school and the end of that restaurant whose name you will write down. And then what happened?

Once I finished school, I went to a three Michelin star restaurant in Belgium called Hof van Cleve.

You just posted about that on Instagram. Was there a mentor of yours there?

Yes. The head chef owner actually closed up shop at the end of last year after Im not sure how many years, but I think it was 30 something years in that restaurant. Three Michelin star. The best of the best. Everything had to be perfect. Everything was perfect from a guest point of view, but also from a working point of view. Only perfection was good enough there.

forThat begs a question, what does that say about you? Because how do you get into that as a new little newbie young guy applying for a job?

I wrote him a nice email saying, look, I'm coming out of culinary school and I love your restaurant. I would love to work with you guys. I got invited for an interview and we had a quick chat. And then they said, okay, now you can come for a two day trial: two days in a row you come and work with us. What they don't tell you when they have a position vacant, they invite five chefs all on the same two days. And then the best one after the two days gets a job.

Is it like Hunger Games?

Pretty much. You put something on the stove, on a low flame, you turn around, it's on a high flame. People try to stitch each other up left, right, and centre. It does get a bit rough that way, but it was kind of fun. At the end of the day, I was lucky enough I got offered the position and it was extremely hard work. We usually got there around seven, eight in the morning, and we usually finished around two o'clock at night. I got paid probably the same amount of money as the rent of my apartment that I was sharing with eight other chefs. But it is an experience and it's something that you do, like going to Uni for chefs. People don't get paid to go to uni. You go to Uni because you want to learn a trade. You go to work in a restaurant like that, not to get paid, but because you want to learn your trade.

That's a good way of looking at it.

You pay your dues and it's hard work. The best thing about that restaurant was that they don't have a specific hierarchy in terms of chef de partie, commis. So obviously there's the head chef owner and then a couple of sous chefs, but below that, everybody's at the same level. So when you sign on, they say, look, realistically you're not going to be here for more than two years because it's pretty rough. You're going to be pretty tired by the end of those two years. But what we do, you start, say in the amuse section as the commis amuse, after three months you become chef de partie amuse, and then after three months you become commis on the fish section. Then three months chef de partie party on the fish section, meat section, pastry, larder, everything. And then they say, if you do that for two years, you've seen every element of the entire kitchen. That was definitely one of the reasons I wanted to work there, because you can learn so much from all these different areas, rather than most of these kind of restaurants where

you go there and you get put in a corner and say, look, this is your corner from now and for however long you're going to be here, these are the dishes that you're cooking and that's it and you're not really going to learn that much more.

It's really generous though, isn't it, for the restaurant because they obviously need to maintain their three stars, but they're also quite forward thinking in terms of the future of chefs as well. That's really great.

For them it's to make people engaged and to get people excited. You're constantly on your toes. Finally when you think, all right, I've got it under control, three months is up and you're moving on to the next thing. You're never really on top of things. Just when you feel like you are, you're moving on. I was a great place.

When you're doing all of those things, do you keep notebooks?

I always had a little small notebook in the back of my pocket. Obviously all the recipes, you write them down for yourself and keep those, but also just little things that you pick up on that you write down, or if you have somebody using a product you haven't heard of before, or somebody using a term o something that you haven't seen before, you write it down and then at night you go home and you Google it and you find out what it is. At that time we had all those products coming up, like Agar-agar and Xanthan gum and all those kind of things. That was just starting up at that time. We had a cabinet with about 50 of them. Obviously I only knew about 10. So you write them all down and you Google and you research and you find out what they are used for and how to use them and where to use them. As a young chef, you're going to go work somewhere amazing, it's good and you're going to learn a lot, but you need to write everything down because otherwise, what's the point of doing it? One of the sous chefs told me, write everything down that you see, everything you learn, write it down. Otherwise, in two years from now, you're going to leave and youre going to be the same idiot as when you came in.

It's good advice. Teaching French, for example, it's one thing I say to students as well is when you're discovering things, it's just that meta thing, isn't it, like writing goals down. You can think them in your head, but until you write it down, it wont stick. It formalises it and then you've got something to refer back to. Okay then, what brought you here?

So after two years there, when I weighed about 30 kilos less than I do now, and the only thing left with weight were bags under my eyes. I thought, that's enough. Let's go travel a little bit. So I went to South America for about six months, just travelled around, ate the local food, went to the hostels and partied and just had a good time. I actually met a couple of Aussie guys that I was really getting along with. They said to me, look, if you're ever bored or you want to do something else, come to Melbourne. So after six months of South America, I came back to Holland and I thought, okay, now I'm going to start my serious life and I'm going to find a job. I looked around and I think five weeks later I booked a ticket to Melbourne, because I was like, you know what, this is not for me. I came here originally with the idea of doing six months in Melbourne, working, earning a bit of money, and then after that six months, going up north, the whole Sydney to Cairns traveling thing. But, well it's 10 years later I'm still here.

Wow. And down on the Mornington Peninsula. Did you start off down there?

No, I was always Melbourne based up until 2020. Early Covid. Then I got an opportunity to go work at Point Leo Estate. My partner and I were looking at each other and she works as a graphic designer. So, during Covid she was able to work from home and didn't necessarily need to be in Melbourne. That's when we just packed up and moved.

A nice place to be over lockdown.

It was great. No, it was amazing. I stayed there for about two and a half, three years.

Senior sous chef?

Yes, so at Point Leo I was there when Phil Wood was the executive chef and Joseph Espuga was then the senior sous chef. I was just a sous chef and then when Phil left, Joseph moved to the culinary director role and I took on his position in the kitchen.

It's such a beautiful place down there. I wrote about Laura when it first opened. And it's astounding.

It's amazing the things a couple hundred million can build. The venue is beautiful. The Gandel family is great. They just love art, they love food, they love their architecture, and they built something truly amazing down there.

Great produce down there as well.

The Peninsula is amazing in that regard. Especially talking to all those little suppliers. You've got Harry who has the mussels in Flinders, you've got Sui at Cape Schanck who has a little olive oil production. You've got the chocolate guys down in Carrum Downs.

And did you use the Tuerong Farm flour?

Yes, Tuerong Farm, we used that. Daniels Run tomatoes. Amazing produce down there. And it's also working in a place like that where you build that relationship with those suppliers. Beau from Wildlife Fisheries, he's got a licence to go diving. He lives around the area and you call him up and say, I want six crayfish for tomorrow. He puts his wetsuit on and goes diving in Port Phillip Bay. That's where your lobsters are coming from. Then that's also the beauty of it. It creates a story for the customers as well when they sit and especially there at the venue, overlook the bay, so when the lobster comes to the table you can say, look, they were swimming there yesterday.

Amazing. Then you were at Jackalope. Executive chef. That's a big role.

Yeah, it's a big role. After Point Leo Estate, I was there for about two years and then Ihad reached as much as I could reach within that company. Jackalope had an opportunity for an executive chef role and that came my way. That was great.

So they're quite different to here in that they are both wineries and on the peninsula. Now you're here. What are some differences you're noticing between the city, Melbourne, and so maybe city customers and the Peninsula?

Well, I think especially post covid, because I think both Covid in general, everywhere, not specifically Peninsula or Melbourne, the spend per head is a lot lower. People used to go out and they get that extra caviar, theyd get the oysters on arrival, theyd buy that expensive bottle of wine. You still get enough customers coming through. But it's just, those little extras on top is a lot less now.

Do you need to factor that into your menu creation?

Yes. You need to make sure that in terms of the menu, you still want to offer those luxury items. But the baseline of all your dishes needs to be affordable. Here at Bar Carolina, yes, we're a fancier restaurant. I mean, it's not your pub grub, so you can charge a little bit more, but once you go into a main course, $60 plus, $70 plus, it becomes more and more exclusive. And it's not that we're making money hand over fist. If we charge those high prices, its just that food is expensive these days. I think across the whole menu, food cost has gone up about 50% and you'd need to charge 50% more. It's not that the owner's driving a more expensive car now that we charge more for the food, but it is what it is. And most customers understand it as well. They know what the situation is. Every now and again, you have somebody who comes in and says, oh, I was here last year and for the same thing, I'm paying so much more. But all you need to say is, have you been to the supermarket lately? It's the exact same story there. It is what it is. And it is a tough environment. I think dining in general is just becoming more and more exclusive. Years ago, living in Prahan, my partner and I used to go to The Smith every week and share a bottle of wine or a couple glasses of wine with a couple of entrees, a main course, some sides and maybe a dessert to share, great food: $200, maybe $250 for the two of us. And that's it. Nowadays, if you go do the exact same thing, it's $400, $450. It really takes the fun out of going out.

How do you do it? How do you get them in during the week, but make it accessible?

I think our menu is pretty affordable across the board. We make sure that especially the main courses and pasta dishes, they are substantial enough that if you just come for that one dish, you leave the restaurant happy and satisfied. But also working with some specials, we are doing something new starting next week called Italian icons. Every Monday night we pick one classic Italian icon. The first one's going to be Pasta Vongole. But the next one can be a really yummy traditional carbonara or a beautiful lasagna. That will be $30 and that's it, $30 with a glass of wine that you buy separately. It still makes it interesting for people to come out. Because there's not a lot of people who can go out on a Monday night and spend a couple hundred dollars every week.

That makes Mondays a lot more exciting. Lots of places are closed on a Monday, so that's nice.

Traditionally Mondays are pretty okay. I guess because a lot of restaurants are closed, but also Monday nights you get a bit more of a hospo crowd. Friday, Saturday are your traditional standard people are usually not that adventurous with their food. But on Mondays you actually do get the hospo crowd in and they do drink the nice wine and they do get the extra oysters and I'm the same. I don't go out super often, but if I go out, then I get everything. I'm going to splurge on whatever is available.

So now you're in this role, this different kind of setting, and you've got a team of people. What's your leadership style?

Yelling and screaming. No, I'm kidding.

I guess Im thinking from thatwellbeing aspect as well, that we talk about these days. So that people aren't losing 30 kilograms and having big bags under their eyes. Obviously there's a limit to how many hours a day people can work, but what are you all doing to look after yourselves?

I think it starts from the top, from the ownership from the restaurant down to the working people. For us, it's very important that everybody has a work-life balance. The rosters I make are somewhere around 40 hours a week, max 45. Of course, every now and again, if there's an odd week out, like a couple weeks ago we had Valentine's Day, and then on the Saturday we had a function, and Monday we launched new menu. A couple of people worked a couple of hours extra, but then they get compensated for that the next week. Either they get an extra day off or they get paid overtime. Making a sustainable roster where you don't work a hundred hours a week, that's where it starts. And then also creating an environment where the actual expectations at work are achievable. I think in a lot of places struggle to get staff. Thats not new in the hospitality industry, but they don't have staff. They go from a team of 10 chefs down to seven, and they're not changing the menu, they're not changing anything in the kitchen dynamics. It's just that these seven people are going to need to pick up the slack of three people not being there. And it creates so much extra pressure. I'm fortunate enough, touch wood, right now that I've got enough staff here. But if I was ever in a scenario where I'm, I'm losing a couple people in the kitchen, I'll just adjust my menu and I'll just make it smaller. If I don't have the staff to do it, then we just do it smaller. Or you cap the amount of seats out the front. That's definitely not something you want to do. But, adjusting to what you have is important.

So with all that in mind and the fact that you've been working here for 10 years, and also in Holland, what would your advice be to young people who are thinking about becoming a chef?

Don't do it.

Don't say that.

I'd say, first of all, think about it really long and hard. It is not super glamorous, or at least not as glamorous as you might think it is. It's a lot of hard work. Theres good pay in it, but you're not going to become a millionaire being a chef. You're going to need to understand that you're going to give up a lot of free time in terms of birthdays, anniversaries, Christmas, New Year's Eve, that it's a conscious decision you need to make that you're going to miss out on a lot of those things. But if you think about all that and you do want to do it, go for it. I would say the main advice would be, go learn under a good chef in a good restaurant, a place where everything is homemade, where only the best produce is bought, where the people who make the food love and care about the food, and actually are passionate themselves. Try and learn as much from them as you can. Don't jump around from job to job to job. Pick a restaurant where you think you really can learn your craft and spend a good amount of time there. A couple years is really good because spending three months here and six months there, you're never really going to go to that inner circle where you actually learn anything. You will always be at the sidelines and by the time you're actually invested, you're out. So yes, learn your craft from somebody who's good at a place where they make good food. That's the main thing.

Bar Carolina, 44 Toorak Road, South Yarra