In the fast lane
Back on MasterChef Australia to lead the top 10 in a service challenge, chef Curtis Stone reflects on the effects of working in adrenaline-fuelled kitchens with
CURTIS Stone is forever running to catch planes. Much to the chagrin of his wife, actress Lindsay Price, Stone hates to waste time sitting around in airport lounges before flights. Instead, he makes every single second count before his departure time – shopping in Duty Free or enjoying a meal at the airport – so that it’s inevitably a stress-inducing sprint to the gate to make the flight.
The jet-setting celebrity chef puts this bad habit down to working in restaurant kitchens for so many years.
“My wife pointed out that I have this quirk about catching planes, she said: ‘You never like to be early, you never like to be first. You always have to get there right in the nick of time’,” he says.
“And I was thinking about that, and I think it’s something to do with what I do for a job because when you’re in a service, you’re always an inch away from a disaster.
“If the tickets are coming too quickly, if you’re not fast enough, if you get backlogged, then you end up a big, long wait where your guests are sitting there waiting 45 minutes for their appetisers or an hour for their mains and they get pretty disappointed.
“So, you are always living in that moment of [pushing yourself to where] you’re going OK, but you’ve got to pick up the pace. I think anxiety makes some people run, it makes some people burst into a big grin and I happen to be one of those people.”
Stone is sharing that love of living on the knife’s edge with the MasterChef Australia contestants this week. In his latest appearance on the Channel 10 cooking series, Stone challenged the contestants to develop a dish for a restaurantstyle service.
“So, the dish has got to be balanced,’ he says.
“It’s got to taste delicious, and it had look pretty.
“But the other side of being a chef, rather than just a home cook, is that you have to be able to execute it for a decent-sized group.
“And then everyone has to be eating about the same time because that’s how restaurants work. I have been ‘chef-ing’ for a long time, so it was really fun to get a bunch of really enthusiastic, high-ambition cooks in one room to play restaurants.”
Restaurant kitchens are adrenaline-fuelled workplaces.
And even the coolest characters working long hours under constant time pressure can easily end up channelling their inner Gordon Ramsay.
“I don’t always keep my cool, if I’m telling the truth,” the laidback Stone laughs.
“You’re right, it is a very passionate environment. I think of it as a bit like playing competitive sport. You don’t run out onto a field in competitive sports and say [in a sweet voice]: ‘Come on chaps, run over this way and do our best’. “You’ve got to be really direct.” With that in mind, Stone insists a heated kitchen environment “isn’t necessarily a negative thing.”
“I am not suggesting I am screaming and berating people. You can encourage people in a variety of ways. You can be nice about it, or you can be a real bozo about it.
“And my wife says that you catch more bees with honey [than with vinegar].”
So, it was with firm, but warm, encouragement that Stone led the MasterChef restaurant novices through their first professional-style service.
Stone has been a regular on the series since its 2009 debut, happily working with both its original lineup of judges – Matt Preston, Gary Mehigan and George Calombaris – and the new guard of Andy Allen, Melissa Leong and Jock Zonfrillo.
Having taken part in the 2023 season has become bittersweet for the celebrity chefs since the shocking death of Zonfrillo.
Stone admits it will be hard for him to now watch the episodes he filmed this year.
“It’s still very raw and unimaginable,” Stone says sadly, before agreeing that he hoped the series would serve as a tribute to Zonfrillo’s memory and his impact on the Australian food scene.
“Jock was one of those incredible humans who really took the time to really dig into Australian ingredients. I long for that opportunity because when I left Australia to cook in London, nobody in any restaurant was cooking with ingredients like Kakadu plum and now they are a lot more available.
“And that’s cooking right? Finding the ingredients that are local or native to you and then applying the techniques you’ve learned to cooking with them.”
Stone only discovered the joy of cooking with native ingredients like finger limes and salt bush when he started cooking professionally. Back when he was a kid, he chuckles, “We thought of Australian ingredients as being something like lamb.”
Now based in Los Angeles with his wife and two young sons, Stone enthuses: “I’m always looking for an excuse to come home.
I love it. I love Australia. My family is there. All of my significant mates are still there.
“So, I really miss the place and I’m lucky enough to come back maybe five or six times a year.”
Apart from catching up with loved ones when he’s back on our shores, Stone always makes time for footy.
“I am a huge Geelong Cats fan,” he says.
“And I played footy at East Keilor Footy Club [when I was younger] in Melbourne and I still go up there to watch the local footy. I love watching my nephews play. I know that sounds not-so-complicated, but I miss the AFL.”
That’s why Stone has made sure his two sons, Hudson and Emerson, are well-versed in AFL, despite being raised in the US.
“My boys play, and people stand there open-mouthed in the park watching us as I kick the ball and they chase it and tackle each other,” he says.
“Because, of course [in America] they are used to watching more organised sports where there’s lots of headgear and pads and there’s very specific plays. It’s not the free for all that Aussie Rules is.
“So, we are over here kicking the footy nightly, flying the flag for Australia.”
MasterChef Australia, Sunday-Thursday, 7.30pm, 10