Page 20 - Foodservice Magazine October 2018
P. 20

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PROFILE
THE VEGAN CHEF (WHO HAPPENS TO BE NON-VEGAN)
SHANNON MARTINEZ AIMS TO MAKE VEGAN FOOD LOOK AND TASTE LIKE MEAT – IT’S WHY
SHE’S AUSTRALIA’S MOST GAME-CHANGING PLANT-BASED CHEF. AND SHE’S NOT EVEN VEGAN.
WITH BUSINESS PARTNER MO WYSE, SHE OPENED MELBOURNE’S GROUND-BREAKING SMITH & DAUGHTERS IN 2014, THEN THE NEARBY DELI A YEAR LATER. THEIR SECOND BOOK, SMITH & DELI- CIOUS, HAS JUST BEEN RELEASED. WHAT, ASKS JILL DUPLEIX, GIVES HER ALL THAT ENERGY - MEAT?
TOP
PROFILE CHEF
Shannon Martinez was bartending at punk music venue East Brunswick Club in Melbourne when the chef went to the
bank and never came back.
“I moved straight into the kitchen, and
never left,” she laughs. It was fairly basic pub food, but she kept getting hit with requests for vegan dishes. “The vegan thing came about more out of annoyance than anything,” she says. “People kept
have done what I was told and made the sticky date pudding their way, but I didn’t want to.”
She chucked it in, married a professional skate-boarder and hit the road, travelling the world as a touring chef for the Vans brand. “I got to cook all over, shopping at markets and cooking whatever I wanted,” she says. “I didn’t learn the classics, but I did learn a weird, left-of-centre home-style cooking, which has become my style.” Music was another major part of her life but by 2004, food won.
At Smith & Daughters, Martinez reckons at least 70 per cent of their customers are meat- eaters, which helps explain the numbers. “Last month we did 5,500 covers in the restaurant. In the Deli, we do up to 600 sandwiches on a Saturday, about 300 doughnuts and about 150 croissants. It’s a massive beast.”
The Spanish/Mexican menu has since turned Italian, with not-beef carpaccio and giant vegan schnitzels. “My food is everyday dining, not fine dining – stuff you want to eat on the couch.”
She did a shout-out to vegan customers to tell her what they miss. “They wanted lasagne, mac and cheese, and Sunday roast, so that’s what I did.” Someone even wanted a tuna bake. “It’s my worst nightmare of a dish, it makes me gag,” she says. “But it’s not all about what I want. Our job is to cook and make people happy.”
The only thing she hasn’t yet been able to veganise is choux pastry, for profiteroles. “And it really pisses me off.”
At Smith & Daughters, Martinez reckons at least 70 per cent of their customers are meat-eaters, which helps explain the numbers. “Last month we did 5,500 covers in the restaurant. In the Deli, we do up to 600 sandwiches on a Saturday, about 300 doughnuts and about 150 croissants. It’s a massive beast.”
Smith & Deli-cious, $50, published by Hardie Grant.
Smith & Daughters, 175 Brunswick St, Fitzroy.
Smith & Deli, 111 Moor St, Fitzroy.
asking for it more and more and I started to see a pattern. So I put a tiny vegan menu on, and it just went ballistic.”
Ballistic meant selling 300 vegan chicken parmas on a Monday night. “People think it’s weird that I’m not a vegan, but our job as chefs is making good food for people, and nobody was making good food for vegan people.”
Having wanted to be a chef since she
was 12, Martinez worked in the kitchen
at the Sofitel throughout high school. An apprenticeship at Stephanie Alexander’s Bridge Road Kitchen was started, but didn’t suit. “I was a shitty brat of a kid and should


































































































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