Celebrity chef Karen Martini puts Australian cuisine in the spotlight

Celebrity chef Karen Martini is adding a new title to her empire as the new food ambassador at the Sydney Opera House and is putting Aussie cuisine and native ingredients on the menu.

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It’s a question Karen Martini is often asked — what is Australia’s national dish? While the celebrity chef says there’s no real answer, she has finally been given the opportunity to put Australian cuisine in the spotlight — including our humble meat pie — or at least her version of it.

The 47-year-old mother of two, who is a regular on Better Homes and Gardens and a judge on My Kitchen Rules, has been named ambassador chef for the Sydney Opera House event spaces.

Her first job was to create a thoroughly Australian menu in keeping with the city’s iconic location.

“It’s hard to define,” Martini tells BW Magazine of Australian cuisine.

“Australians, including chefs, growers and producers, are really good travellers and love to explore the world and they bring back a little of everything to Australia.

Celebrity chef Karen Martini is the newly appointed Trippas White Group Ambassador Chef for Sydney Opera House event venue, the Yallamundi Rooms. Picture: Supplied

“It’s not just a prawn on the barbecue, that’s for sure.

“Internationally we are very well known for our seafood and livestock, as well as our produce — we grow everything from wasabi to fresh berries, so we have everything at our fingertips.”

Having said that, Martini couldn’t resist having a go at the meat pie in her new winter menu for one of the venues at the Opera House.

Her idea for a deconstructed pie incorporates an eye fillet in a black barley and native pepperberry braise of kangaroo and oxtail topped with a native bush tomato sauce.

One of the dishes Karen Martini has created in her new role. Picture: Daniel Boud

The chef, who describes her cooking style as “wildly composed” and “Australian cuisine with an international flare”, says she was excited to explore the breadth of native Australian ingredients for her new menus.

“I wanted to showcase native ingredients, but if you’re not totally living in that world, it can be an awkward menu for diners,” she says.

“So I lay awake at night thinking of ways to weave native ingredients through my Mediterranean style.

“I’ll also often dream about food and I’ll wake up with inspiration for my dishes.”

Starting her career in the kitchen at just 16, Martini has built a food empire that includes popular Melbourne eatery Mr Wolf, cookbooks and television presenting.

Despite her early start in a male-dominated industry, Martini says she never shied away from the often pressurised challenge of a commercial kitchen.

“Being a woman in the industry didn’t phase me, even though there were so few women when I started,” she says.

“And there were no digital platforms to tune into then either, you had to hustle and bustle your way into kitchens to get experience and inspiration. It was a very different world.

Karen Martini has created a new Australian menu. Picture: Daniel Boud

“It wasn’t an easy environment to thrive in, it was survival of the fittest.”

Martini has passed on her passion to at least one of her two daughters — Amber, 11, loves to help mum in the kitchen but Stella, 12, is a more enthusiastic consumer.

“I get paid to think about food 24/7, whether for TV, a cookbook, my restaurant or now, the Sydney Opera House,” she says.

“So the girls have become used to eating the best of the best; they’ll choose crab linguine over spaghetti bolognaise every time.

“They’ve been eating out since they were three or four, they love the whole experience of eating out, sitting at the table to chat, the whole thing.

“Amber will happily help me in the kitchen, making a vinaigrette or picking herbs from the garden. But Stella prefers to eat, though she is becoming interested in baking.”