chef robin

Thought i should post my reply. With regards to the prawn noodle dish this came about after getting hold of some 'transglutiminaise'. Rather than just throwing it radomily into food, we had a recipe for the prawn noodles and started there, we then played around with recipes and new recipes to see what we could come up with . We now use it in completly new and original dishes. My trip to America and staging at Alinea gave me ideas and i saw new techniques that after cooking for over ten years in some pretty good restaurants i had seen before. When i got back to my own kitchen of course we played around and saw how we could use these techniques in our own food. We have quite a few dishes on our menus and they change about every 6 weeks. We are always coming up with new and evolved dishes for our menus. I totally agree that Chefs Achatz, Cantu and Dufresne are some of the top chefs in the world but I am sure they would agree that true originality comes from inspiration itself. If they do come up with a new technique as say someone like Ferron Adria has in the past. Of course people are going to imitate it and evolve it.

Reviews are part of running and cooking in a restuarnt and you have to come to accept them good or bad. We have had a share of both at interlude which is fair enough. People ar allowed to voice their opinions. The thing that bothers me most about reviews is when details are false but yet still printed. There are serious reviewers who take their jobs as seriously as those people they are reviewing and take the time out to check facts before going to print. As you stated ozmouse i have never heard of the reviewer from the Australian and his review was filled with misleading inaccurcies. Yes we do not offer a choice, but our waiters put you through a process of finding out any dietary requirements, like dislikes etc, so although there is no choice we can alter the menus to suit requirements. the prawn cocktail dish is actually served on a plastic pipette, there is no 'toothpick' anywhere near the dish. he also talks about a complementary squab dish we sent him, that his partner doesn't eat. We often send extra course to people we know or industry people. Im not sure why he was sent an extra course but it could have happened. If we had sent an extra course we would have checked before that it was something they could both eat. there is nothing more embarresing than sending out a complementary dish that the guest cannot eat. On the off chance that this did happen the squab would have been immediatelly removed and another dish bought out. He also comments about only four tables being taken on a tuesday night. All our reservations are automated. i have checked every Tuesday since we opened and they have all been nearly full. Mr Megalogenis also says about not being full after the eight course. Our eight course is equivelant to two courses from an a la carte menu, (again this would have been explained by the waiter), so most people would not be full after it. Maybe he should have had the 11 course. His final and most irritating comment was 'i cant see myself going back . I feel as if we've already had everything on the menu'. He had tried only 9 course from 38 different course we offer from a menu that changes around every 6 weeks. How exactly does he think he has tried everything on the menu. I dont normally respond to reviews and they dont ever alter how i run my business. I just wanted to point out exactly how inaccurate some of these reviews are and yes in some cases, although not this one, they could be damaging to some businesses. The public should not believe everything they read. Chef Robin

Chef Robin can correct me on this, but I swear I once saw lambs brains (crumbed and fried) on his menu sometime last year. btw, I should add that intestines were old another favourite from the family dinners. I also remember going to Sydney with the family and going to a Chinese restaurant where they served a sublime dish of stir fried bone marrow. I had this particular dish when I was probably no older than 8 or 9 years old and I still remember it. ← Yes Lamb brains have been on the menu, as well as whole pigs head, jowl, black pudding(not really offal i know), trotters, sweetbreads, tripe. Lots of Duck offal, gizzards, heart We are big fans of offal here. Still trying to persuade a butcher to get me pig lungs.

Its on Thursday 9th Feb. more details www.interlude.com.au

Next week will be our 2nd year birthday. I'd would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for their support and custom over the last 2 years. Of course we couldn't have a birthday without a party. As last year we let our customers pick their favourite dishes for the menu we (i) thought it was only fair if this year i got to pick my favourite things. Should be a cracking night. For your interest the menu is; Things I Like; scallops,pizza,sweetcorn,pigeon, apple pie, bacon, duck, sweetbreads,sardines, malted milk, doughnuts, twix Our 3rd year looks set to be our best year yet ( and the last two haven't been bad) with our degs in full swing. We look forward to welcoming many of you back this year and meeting those of you who have yet to visit us. Regards Chef Robin

Sam, When i dined at wd-50 i had a dessert of grapefruit in grapefruit. What did you use in the grapefruit foam, it seemed to be stiff enough that you could quenelle it around the sorbet but still had the feel of a foam. Also have you tried using transglutiminaise in any desserts yet?

Interlude had come a long way since we opened two years ago. This change over to degustation only is something I have been wanting to do for some time, but we thought leaving it until the New Year would be the best option. As a chef and restaurateur I am always looking to challenge myself and my staff and to push the limits of what the restaurant can offer as a dinning experience. We had taken the menu in its current state as far as we could. I have always felt the public had a lot more confidence in other skilled trades than chefs. For example if you went to a top hair stylist or a interior designer you would tell them roughly what you liked and then let them work their magic, after all that’s what you’re paying them for. But for some reason people are a lot more reluctant to do that in restaurant despite the fact that chef’s train long and hard. We will still have a menu at Interlude with the three options, that will each contain slightly different dishes, but ultimately you will be letting us cook for you. The dining experience will be same in that the 8 course menu will be equivalent to a regular three courses in other restaurants, and the 11 and tour menus will be the same as previous degustation menus. The tour being made of lots of little tastes and bites. This is not a new concept by any means and more and more top restaurants around the world are moving over to this style of restaurants as for a chef it offer them a chance to really show what they are capable of. I look forward to cooking for you all soon at Interlude

This is an intersting topic. I guess each chef has their own ideas about what a 3 hat restuarnt should be and can achieve. It would definately be an option to play it safe at hold onto the award, nobody wants to lose hats and go down in the rankings. But can you justify charging more(as all restaurants would raise their prices in going from 2 to 3 hats) for the same product you were doing 6 months ago. To me the change would open a whole lot of new possibilities to move the restaurant onto a whole new level that would be fitting a 3 hat restaurant. For example when we moved from 1 to 2 hats, yes we were able to charge more and we were busier, but this meant we could do things with the food and the service we would never had been able to do as a one hat restaurant. If it doesn't work and you end up losing the hats then maybe you wern't meant to have them in the first place. As for commenting on which restaurants deserve 3 or dont that not for me to say.

Next year, I'd really like to get a bunch of eGulleters together for a dinner at Interlude. I'm very keen for a return visit and I know PCL hasn't been there yet. Robin Wicken's food is sublime (and hello to Robin if he's reading....want to do a special deal for us? ) ← Always happy to accommidate food lovers. Don't think Tim has been in yet either!! drop me a line robin@interlude.com.au

Hi Emma, Not sure what type of restaurant work you are looking for. But my advice would be to buy the Sydney or Melbourne resturant guides when you get here and phone round the places that interest you. Many of the top restuarants dont actually advertise for staff in the papers,websites etc. Good Luck