Sexy, inventive and satisfying - and that's just the food

Since it was first published in 1990, legendary chef Marco Pierre White's book White Heat - a heady mix of brash opinion, extraordinary recipes and gritty black-and-white photography - has inspired a generation of chefs the world over.

Darren Robertson was one of those lads hooked on tales of the culinary world's enfant terrible. "I had no aspirations to be a chef whatsoever," he says. "I was studying art and design, but I got given this book with these supercool black and-rock-star chef in the kitchen.

To a 17-year-old kid in Deal [in the UK's Kent], it had such an impact on me. I took it home and read it in one night and thought, 'That's it. That's what I want to do. I'm going to go to culinary college and become a rock-star chef'."

Long hours and low pay are the abiding rules of the real-world cooking game, says chef Darren Robertson.

Robertson's world tour started in Kent and led him to Gravetye Manor, a Michelin-starred country house in West Sussex. He stayed for three and a half years, where he worked alongside Australians who "were always harping on about Australia and Sydney and Tetsuya's".

One call by the boss, and Robertson was on a plane to Sydney to work in the kitchen of Tetsuya Wakuda. "I landed on the Thursday, started working on the Tuesday and stayed there for eight years," he says.

Robertson, now 37, rose to the rank of head chef, enforcing the techniques, style and language of food that has kept Tetsuya's in the highest echelons among the world's best restaurants.

"The work Tetsuya was doing was incredibly forward-thinking, really clever food. It was so completely different from anything I had done before."

In 2010, Robertson left Tetsuya's and resisted the temptation to open a place of his own - "I really had nothing to give; after cooking Tetsuya's food for eight years I wanted to do something that was my own."

Instead he travelled, eating at some of the world's most famous restaurants, including elBulli and Mugaritz in Spain and Heston Blumenthal's The Fat Duck in England. "I had a meal at St John, Fergus Henderson's place; it's incredibly casual, no tablecloth, just cutlery and a wineglass, that's it. It was my last meal in the UK before heading back and it was a light-bulb moment - I thought, 'Wow, this is such a great way to eat. It's bloody brilliant."

Back in Sydney that revelation translated into Robertson starting a pop-up restaurant. One of these dinners was held at Three Blue Ducks, a friend's cafe in Bronte. "We did this dinner and something just clicked, so I joined the guys, three [ducks] became five and that was it," he says. "There are two of us who cook, a barista, a front-of-house manager and a barman, so we all have an active role in the business. I never wanted to recreate a restaurant where it was just one guy's name above the door."

Though the Ducks couldn't be further from the formality of Tetsuya's, the two eateries share a style, says Robertson. "Tetsuya's philosophy was always to get the best ingredients you can afford and do as little as possible to make them amazing. And that's still what we try to do now. Despite the fact we've got no tablecloths, we're next to a bus stop, it's got graffiti and it's more casual, I think the philosophy is the same. We're still using the same suppliers I've been using for 13 years." But whereas the degustation menu at Tetsuya's is more than $200 a head, dinner at the Ducks is priced at $17 for any - and every - plate.

"We don't believe that one ingredient has more value than another," Robertson says. "I don't think the producer or farmer has put any less love into the carrot than someone farming kingfish. So we've made every dish the same price. We don't make much money, but that's all right." Long hours and low pay are the abiding rules of the real-world cooking game - something the media, and TV in particular, conveniently edits out of their portrayals of the industry. "Unfortunately, now there's an obsession with celebrity, so you see a lot of kids who just want to be famous. The reality of it in the harsh light of a kitchen isn't glamorous at all. And I think generation Y have realised there are far easier ways to make money than standing on your feet for 12 hours a day." But I strongly encourage entering the industry. It's an incredible life skill. You're in this pack of guys and gals and it's pure creativity, and that's really seductive. So go nuts, get in a kitchen, start cooking at home - don't worry about the celebrity rubbish."

But, by all means, read White Heat.

Colin Fassnidge, chef

HE'S been dubbed the 'poet of pork' by the food media for his love of nose-to-tail eating and referred to by less generous names on Twitter and elsewhere for his uncensored views.

He's also been called a rock-star chef for his long-haired, hard-drinking, motorbike-riding ways, and a sex symbol following his stint as the straight-talking judge on this season's My Kitchen Rules. But boring? No, Colin Fassnidge has never been called that.

Dublin-born Fassnidge made his name at the Four in Hand in Sydney's Paddington, where, since 2005, he has championed whole-beast cooking, serving up all manner of strange pig bits - first to derision and now to widespread acclaim. "I just love using all the odd bits. I love the flavour," Fassnidge, 40, says.

"When we first took over Four in Hand and served up pigs' ears and tails, people panicked and said it wouldn't work; it's [food] for dogs. Now bring the clock forward and we've got two hats and everyone's talking about pigs' ears and what wines to match with them."

Like most overnight success stories, Fassnidge's star has been years in the making. "You've got to love what you do," he says, "not just because it's trendy." And being a chef in downtown Dublin in the early 1990s was anything but. '

"When I became a chef, it was a loser job. But I hated school; they were the worst years of my life. Then I went to catering college and it was like being set free. You get to cook all day - and you get paid!"

A stint in a small Michelin-starred restaurant in Dublin led to a job working with Raymond Blanc at Le Manoir aux. Quat'Saisons in Oxford, England, where the days were long, the pressure relentless and the praise scant. But the lessons learnt were invaluable, not least of which was an enduring respect for seasonality.

"We had gardens there, when it wasn't trendy to pick your own veg. It all sounds very romantic but when it's snowing, freezing in England and you've had only four hours' sleep and you have to pick the veg, clean it, prep it, it's not."

There Fassnidge worked alongside Justin North (Bécasse), and it was at North's urging that he headed to Sydney for a one-month holiday. That was in 1999. "It was just before the Olympics, so Sydney was crazy. It was great. I came from this repressive, military English kitchen and I was like, 'I'm in heaven'," he says.

Along the way he has acquired venues (the 16-month-old 4 Fourteen in Surry Hills, along with the Four in Hand); married Jane ("I met her in Sydney, which was not the plan. I came to meet a tall Aussie blonde, but I met a girl from Northern Ireland"); had two daughters, Lily, three, and Maeve, two ("I used to lead my kitchen with the rod, but then I had kids and everything changed. I mellowed and my cooking got better"); is becoming a familiar face on television; and has picked up more than 7000 followers on Twitter.

"That's why I got the role on MKR. If you're not using social media as a younger guy, and it's your business, you're an idiot. I use a knife and I also use a phone," he says. "But to get a lot of followers you've got to be controversial. I learnt from mistakes where I could've been sued, but I learnt pretty quick. Now I might annoy certain people, but I do it in such a way that I can't get sued."

Those controversial rants include picking fights with TV presenter Tracy Grimshaw after a meal at the Four in Hand, and incensed MKR fans who took him to task for his judging comments or appearance. And don't get him started on restaurant review website Urbanspoon. "It's just disgruntled freaks who go and write on Urbanspoon … At least with Twitter, if someone says something, you can find out who it was and ask about the problem. On Urbanspoon, people can write anything. That's a load of sh*t."

When he's not railing at the world on Twitter, or sorting through eight years of recipes for an upcoming cookbook, or hunting pigs with pygmies in the jungle for a Discovery Channel pilot, Fassnidge's young family commands all his attention.

"Spending time with the kids chills me out and brings me back down to earth. In TV land you've got lots of people telling you how good you are - even though you're not - so it's good to come home so people can tell you how sh*t you are. And that's just your kids!"

He laughs: "I was saying to my missus the other day, 'I don't get it. People are like, "Your husband's a sex symbol"' and my missus was like, 'Are you on drugs?! Have you seen the state of him?' You just get no compliments at my house. If I were 20, I'd be on fire - the number of women I could have. Now I'm 40, got two kids, I'm quite happy just chilling out at home, cooking dinner."

Source: News Limited Network, 4 August 2013