Behind the Apron: Chef Morgan on Tabasco's Hot List
Aug 16, 2023
Culinary geeks, this one is a treat!
We recently interviewed Chef Morgan, about his lifelong passion and journey as a chef and chatted to him about Stuart Alexander’s The Hot List by Tabasco; plus we found out how one of the hottest chefs right now, was tapped on the shoulder to be the Tabasco ambassador.
Barcats: What do you think of the Tabasco Hot List Competition? How is it inspiring? Especially being named as the Ambassador.
Morgan: I truly believe that this competition in particular will incentivise young chefs to take part and take their careers to the next level.
So many other comps that I see out there in the industry just provide a cash prize, perhaps, go buy new sneakers with it.… That’s a great addition to your sneaker collection but that’s it.
The Hot List gives you something better, I’m talking about the opportunity to go travelling, and see something that seriously blows your culinary world! John and I from the Stuart Alexander team travelled to Louisiana to go and see first-hand the magic that gets created at Tabasco HQ. I was blown away by their commitment to product quality and how true they are to their story.
Now, I've made a lot of hot sauce in my day, but this was another level, no thickening agents, no heating wands in sight! Every bottle is at least three years old, not to mention the eight-year-old family reserve blend, unlike some other sauces [not naming any names!] that just use heating wands.
Now, the latter may be made in six weeks but it’s not even close to the authenticity and quality that you get in every bottle of Tabasco.
The consistency is there, no matter what part of the world you have it in.
Even chatting with the employees there, they really enjoyed working there. It is run like a small family-style business. John's idea was to start this whole list [The Hot List], when he told me about it, I thought: ‘Man, this is really cool, especially being aligned with a globally recognised brand like Tabasco, his competition for developing the careers of young chefs and giving back to our industry really ties into the legacy of Tabasco.’
Barcats: How has the culinary industry evolved, and what changes have you both observed in professional kitchens?
Morgan: When I was a young chef, there was almost this hazing-like culture. We used to call it Chef Stockholm Syndrome.
Your confidence gets beaten to a pulp and you are submerged in an abusive, negative experience and learning environment. If you stay the course, eventually most of those chefs end up going full circle, dishing out the same stress and teaching young apprentice chefs in a state of learned helplessness.
Slowly, we can start to see a shift in that paradigm where we move away from this unhealthy environment and create an inclusive and respectful environment. Nothing like my time in Paris, if I told my staff what I had to go through they wouldn’t believe me.
Barcats: Well, today you'd have Fair Work knocking on the door.
Morgan: You'd probably have Tracy Grimshaw and that's enough to scare anyone, you know! But like, no one wants to be on ACA, that's for sure.
Barcats: It's great that chefs and mentors like yourself are just breaking that mould, and creating new workplaces that are based on respect and learning.
Morgan: Yeah, exactly, you know, I turn 50 next year and I didn't think I'd be still cooking the way I am now, but I actually really love working, mainly I love working with a fantastic team of people and witnessing them flourish and grow.
One of my staff who still works with us, I initially thought was not going to last because her attitude wasn’t great. So we just sat down one day and said, "You know what, you can work anywhere, but I think you'd do really well here. So let's start by moving you around to different stations and see where you shine.” And then, it was like a flick of a switch, she now supervises other staff and can run the place without me having to be there.
Barcats: Let’s pivot and talk about your time when you opened Belle’s and your experiences during Covid.
Morgan: Yeah. so I opened up Belle's in 2014. I came back from America, after living there and running a restaurant in Nashville. But after four years in Nashville, it was time for a change, to be honest. I didn't want to do that style of food anymore.
My light bulb moment was I could do this style of wines that I really have a passion for and pair them with fried chicken, the concept was to simply elevate them, you know in a Chef-y sort of style. We jumped on a gap in the market in 2014, as "dude food" was still kind of developing, but you had to make it decent. We also got really lucky with some opportunities. That’s when I met John, doing the Barangaroo pop-up, when NOMA was in town, I was really lucky to get that. I knew Rene and the guys at NOMA for years, I just did a ton of pop-ups, it took me all over the world.
Then after my son was born in 2019, which was just the start of COVID I think. The plans for a move to Copenhagen were put on hold, but another opportunity came up and I opened up another rotisserie chicken shop, which was Sundays. Now we're actually moving the whole concept to the North Shore, turning the Potts Point venue into a cocktail bar.
Jenna Hemsworth has come on as our business partner and she's opening a bar there. I'll just do the menu, and put a chef in there, but the real star will be Jenna, who used to work at Baxters and all those cool places.
And then last year, my best mate Nathan said, “We should open up a wine bar, we have a lot of wine”, (I've actually been collecting wine since 2014). So we came across this fabulous space - now Copains in Surry Hills, which opened up last December.
Barcats: That’s awesome, and how about that write-up in the Qantas magazine recently? Congratulations!
Morgan: Yeah. Just last week, it was crazy. Listed in the top 12 wine bars in Australia, They gave us number 1. Initially, I thought it was listed in alphabetical order haha. It's not a competition. It's just good to be mentioned, you know! We're lucky it is in Surry Hills because it's such a fantastic local community, we got some really good support from our locals, so that's really cool.
Barcats: Amazing! So let’s touch on your connection with Sean at Husk.
Morgan: Yeah. So I went there in 2011. I actually was only meant to go there for a month in Charleston, South Carolina. And then after two weeks, I guess, they asked for a job and then they gave me a job.
And then the day I started, we got awarded the best restaurant in America from Bon Appetit. I thought that was pretty special, I ended up staying with Sean for just under four years all up, then after two years in South Carolina, Sean asked me to be the head chef, which is Chef de Cuisine of Husk in Nashville. So then I moved to Nashville. I think I was the first foreigner to run a kitchen in the Southern states of America, a bit of an honour really.
I never wanted to have a manager position for the two years that I was in Charleston. I just wanted to learn the cuisine from the base-up, like working as a prep cook, as a butcher, and then working on the line with all the other guys. But man, venues opened up at 4 p.m., and closed by midnight, it's intense, I was in my thirties at that stage, so it was a bit of a grind.
Then in 2013, Husk was voted the most anticipated restaurant opening in America. And I was like, I was the head chef. So, the first night we opened, we had like the Black Keys, we had Dolly Parton. You'd see, you know, Darius Rucker from Hootie and the Blowfish. It was on another level, you know.
Barcats: What an experience cooking for that crowd! Can I just touch back on whether you did formal training as a chef?
Morgan: I started my apprenticeship in the nineties at a place called the Summit. Then, for Luke Mangan and the Merivale Group at the Hotel CBD. Then 5 years with Mirabel Group. I went to Europe for a while. I worked in a three Michelin Star Restaurant in Paris for just over a year, then I came back to Australia and worked again with Luke Mangan at SALT in the early 2000s.
Barcats: What a career have you had! What's your parting of knowledge to the next generation of young chefs?
Morgan: It comes down to hard work and application, but also just ask a lot of questions, I know people's patience gets tested when you keep asking questions, but at the end of the day, you ask questions about things you’re passionate about, so unlock your full potential, it might be cheffing, or maybe you want to work or as a mixologist or maybe you want to shape your craft as a barista.
You just gotta take the plunge and just have a crack, show your enthusiasm to learn! Ask questions, how to do things, specific procedures etc.
Barcats: That’s some great advice. So the Hot List, who should apply to this competition? Is it people that are already working in restaurants that can put up those dishes?
Morgan: This Hot List that we're developing, it's about the future of the hospitality industry especially, You could be a bank manager, It’s open to anyone in your staff community on Barcats, I hope they all sign up!
I’m looking for someone to put up three of the best dishes that really depict the heart and soul of Tabasco. They're going to get the same level of praise and, you know, scrutiny as someone who's working at Margaret's by Neil Perry.
There are no formalities with this competition. Now, of course, because of its competitive nature, I think you will find a lot of the people that are going to enter are going to be from restaurant backgrounds. And I have tapped the shoulder of a lot of young chefs, so I think there will be some great dishes being presented.
The Hot List is for people who have a passion for the product of Tabasco and are willing to work outside of their comfort zone. What I'm most looking forward to is the community that buys into the legacy of helping young chefs, getting them into the right environments to learn and progress in their careers.
What an honour it was to chew the fat with Chef Morgan and his passion for his devotion to progressing our industry for the better. Now if you have a passion for food and perhaps missed out on Masterchef, then here is your opportunity to shine. We encourage you to join the Tabasco Hot List competition - good luck!
Entries to the Tabasco Hot List competition close on August 28, 2023.
