foodjournals.

Home in Brisbane - Australien - 24 A journal of my work as I work in the best restaurants in the world. "Anyone can cook... but only the fearless can be great!" - Gusteau, Ratatouille. Currently off on rehab with a rotator-cuff shoulder injury... cheers squash #no(mad) Please note: Not all work here is my own. This is merely a journal for reference purposes only.

[bartonwillis-blog]

I still need a new lens and need to hire a decent food photographer. One thing at a time, I suppose.

[bartonwillis-blog]

Groundwork.

I have written my first business plan. Still in a draft format. Honestly, all I want is to set up a skills trade between Denmark and Australia. I would love to see a real fine dining scene in Brisbane, full of my friends. Build something at home as a reflection of where I’m from. Honestly though, if I weren’t made to leave Denmark in the first place and could have remained in my job, I just simply wouldn’t have left. That was a raddd job, for a super cool chef.

Edit: I need to provide finances for my family before such time as I could leave again as well. My father has been pretty ill for quite some time. He’s going to need a lot of physio → fortunately my first apprentice (whom head-hunted me the cheeky bastard) is in sports science. I’m hoping he can help both me and my father. Currently staying with a paramedic and she’s at least keeping my spirits up. It sucks not being able to do the things you love :-(

[intensefoodcravings]

Pork Tenderloin Stuffed with Shallots, Poached Pears, and Blue Cheese | The Every Girl

[bartonwillis-blog]

Stunning

[kasperwashere]

Restaurant Kadeau finally got their first star this year. I visited the restaurant on the island of Bornholm last summer. As one of the most hyped nordic kitchens, Kadeau has an outstanding location, right on the beach on the southside of the island - with local food growing litteraly right outside their windows. This particular starter, a scallop with seaweed and plants collected on the beach, was just the beginning of a magnificent eight course menu with accompanying wines. Truly one for the books. They have opened a restaurant in Copenhagen as well - I highly recommend both - but the stunning location on the beautiful island of Bornholm makes it worth traveling for. WEBSITE

[somewhere-someone-blog]

A rainbow of fermentation 🌈 #kadeau @johannestorpestudios @therudolfs @restaurantkadeau (her: kadeau)

[bartonwillis-blog]

Note to Self: Buy a macro lens goddammit! 

[bartonwillis-blog]

On top of the former, I will also be helping re-open The Pawn in Wan Chai, Hong Kong for Tom Aikens at the end of this month for a week, before shipping some of my cooking equipment back home from Copenhagen. Always a good excuse to travel, isn't it? Exciting.

[bartonwillis-blog]

Hi, Hey, How are ya ?

So, I realise it’s been a long time between posts… keeping well, are we? Yes?

Okay, so… to the news. Let’s get into it then. I’ve begun private cheffing. I will be starting that as of next quarter, as well as some other work I’m doing at the same time. Busy boy. I will be available whenever necessitated, will drive to you with equipment (in my BMW, you know… all swank as hell), set up, cook, teach you and show you what I’m doing, pack down, wash up, dispose of waste and remove it all. As though I was never there. Because that’s just the kind of guy I am haha! Secondly, I have purchased two new domains. They will soon point to this website. Soon… Speaking of which, I really need to update this. And I will do that, soon. These new domains can be found at www.foodjournals.com.au to represent my Australian colleagues, my Australian base and my Australian work. An altogether worldwide domain, www.foodjournals.com and this will join my already existing, www.foodjournals.co.uk (where you hopefully found me). Now, I have most of the equipment… certainly enough for a party of 2 to a maximum of 12. I will be adding to this often, regular, and will be continuing to grow this base. I have amazing equipment, including none other than the Mauviel copper pans and pots… you know, nice, great equipment to cook on and show you how to cook with. This will be my first real commitment to this and I will be photographing my work with my Nikon DSLR to document the progress, naturally. I really need some more lessons in photography, but have a pretty good understanding already.

I will then be going onto cooking for the homeless and to raise awareness for Autism on my brother’s behalf. I will be providing a job for this young man and teaching him basic ethics of work and basic domestic skills to look after himself. This will come at a later date however (upon a commercial space) and will not impact on my private chef work, as that is a strictly an intimate experience that I would like to share with people myself, as well as an intimate experience where it is though I’m not even there.  I will soon sort out a pricing structure. More to come...

[bartonwillis-blog]

Nuno Mendes. Honestly, a chef I would love to work for again. I staged for him some time in June of last year and it was definitely the best stage I've done to date. They're willing to actually teach you things - new techniques and the like - that actually make the stage worthwhile doing. 

[bartonwillis-blog]

A granola worth eating!

[bartonwillis-blog]

Marcus Wareing at The Berkeley - Mushrooms!

[bartonwillis-blog]

Oysters anyone?

[demonlabirinth]

[bartonwillis-blog]

Maaemo Appetizer by bXMi on Flickr.

[sincerelygracec]

Dear Pickle Lovers,

     I love pickles. Especially pickles that go through a magical fermentation process. Magic makes everything taste better.                        Sincerely,                                                                          

                                 GraceC

[m-rated-deactivated20170112]

[bartonwillis-blog]

Carrot garden @ Ledoyen

[bartonwillis-blog]

Temping at Galvin at Windows.

The past few weeks before Christmas I was doing some temp work for Galvin at Windows. I was hugely excited, it was a restaurant a former Chef of mine had done some of his training, temping at a 1 star whilst getting paid by the hour... doesn't get much better than that, right? Short answer, no. Long answer, well...  Sadly, I was met with a lot of disappointments from the place, primary of all was that I found myself doing food at a standard I believed was lesser than that of other Michelin star kitchens I'd either worked or staged at previously. It seemed to me that the quality of the food and the attention to detail as we were doing numbers that were grossly disproportionate to the ability of that kitchen were that less of restaurants I'm aware of rising to reach their first star. I was disappointed. The level of professionalism the chefs displayed too left something to be desired. There was a lack of unity and no real team spirit. It seemed to me that anybody that had been there for some time was just about to resign, leaving the kitchen hollow; a team of temps and inexperienced and undertrained Chef de Parties. With the pressures of a fully-booked 100-odd-seater restaurant you could definitely see the fault lines and cracks of what I presume was once a great giant among the London food scene. This said, the kitchen is getting a refurb in January and I hope for their sake that this rejuvenates what appears to be a very sad kitchen team.

A Side Note: The view is beautiful. Honestly. I can't compare it to anything else I've seen yet out a restaurant window. I imagine it could be a nice place to get a drink actually. Bar food seemed mostly alright, despite the fecal tract still intact in the prawns served on a skewer. I haven't actually seen the drinks list though to be fair.

[bartonwillis-blog]

This was us getting filmed for Danish TV2, airing sometime next month… i think the 8th or something. We are presenting our weekly projects, this was Ris a la Mande; a traditional Danish dessert - speculated to have been invented at D’anglaterre - with a French background. This is considered an old hat for Danish chefs of this generation and so we were re-inventing it. The highlight of these projects was a Ris a la Mande made with sea buckthorn sauce - it had beautiful acidity.