How troubled Bay teen found career, cooked for royalty

He now works at popular Bay restaurant Black Bear, owned by MKR winners Dan and Steph Mulheron

My Kitchen Rules winner and Black Bear owner Dan Mulheron with sous chef Travis Mares.

His life was going off the rails when a Hervey Bay man found the ingredient that would turn everything around.

Travis Mares came from a broken family and a "quite disruptive" home life, but he found solace and "a sense of purpose" in the kitchen of Nikenbah's Carinity Education Glendyne.

He has now cooked meals for English royalty, worked with celebrity chefs, and run kitchens across Australia.

Travis, now working at Hervey Bay's popular Black Bear restaurant, believes he wouldn't have developed the taste for his chosen profession if not for Carinity.

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Travis's life was troubled when he enrolled at Carinity Education Glendyne in Hervey Bay as a teenager.

He shared his experience at the school recently in an interview with Carinity.

"Glendyne's facilities were amazing, he said.

"You got the chance to cook amazing things.

"The structure of Glendyne I found so much more productive, especially as I needed extra mentoring and someone to show me a little attention and care.

"I had a lot of mentoring at school and I chose the right path.

Black Bear sous chef Travis Mares has cooked for royalty.

"I learned really quickly that life's a lot better when you're working towards your goals.

"Towards the end of school, they would ask you what you wanted to be, and I said, 'I want to be a chef. I want to be a young Gordon Ramsay'."

 

 

Principal Dale Hansen, one of Travis's mentors at school, said while most students "have the aptitude to cook" some are initially apprehensive about studying hospitality.

"When they realise hospitality is one of the largest employment pathways in Australia, and a skill and trade that can take them to all corners of the globe, it becomes desirable," he said.

After graduating as the Dux of the school, Travis completed his apprenticeship as a chef in Uluru, where he prepared meals for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Prince William and his wife Catherine.

Ten years into his culinary career, Travis has worked in every state and territory of Australia except Tasmania.

He has returned to Hervey Bay to work as sous chef at Black Bear, owned by My Kitchen Rules winners Dan and Steph Mulheron.

"When you're in a kitchen, and even when we were students at school, it feels like a small family working together as a team," Travis says.

"It's that camaraderie that I missed from my childhood that I love. It makes you feel like you're wanted."

Originally published as SUCCESS STORY: How troubled Bay teen found career, cooked for royalty