“I was looking for a job.”

Ask Ben O’Donoghue how he wound up as executive chef at Establishment 203 and that’s the succinct response, delivered with his trademark wry grin.

O’Donoghue became a household name in Australia on the back of co-hosting Surfing the Menu with Curtis Stone. More recently, he ran his own popular Brisbane venues, Billykart Kitchen and Billykart West End.

O’Donoghue is a fine chef with a reputation for excelling with red-meat proteins. Then, of course, there’s that laid-back TV star power. But he says he’s at Establishment 203 – beef company Stanbroke’s soon-to-open Italian steak restaurant – for the same reason many of us take a job: he wanted a new challenge.

“I was looking for something I could sink my teeth into,” he says. “It’s an opportunity to get involved with a business that has a substantial footprint. It’s a generational agricultural company raising beef in Queensland, and it’s vertically integrated, really giving you the opportunity to express that kind of paddock-to-plate cooking.

“We’d like to [be] in the top 100 steak restaurants in the world. That’s an aspiration. We’ve got the product, [and] the company is putting the aesthetics in place.”

Establishment 203 should indeed be a looker, with Tamsin Johnson – one of Australia’s most in-demand interior designers on the back of her work with Rae’s, Sir and Lucy Folk, among others – consulting on furnishings, fabrics and lighting.

Occupying the Fortitude Valley space on the corner of Ann and Marshall streets – once home to Monastery nightclub – the main dining room will feature banquette seating down its centre and large booths along one wall. Materials will include polished green marble, brushed brass, tanned leather, and glass brick.

O’Donoghue and his chefs will work behind low counters intended to keep them engaged with the restaurant floor. Protein will be cooked over both wood fire on a Mibrasa cooking station, and an enormous MKN induction system.

“It’s the first of its kind in Brisbane, an MKN induction suite,” O’Donoghue says. “So it’s going to be an amazing kitchen to work in technically. You find them in Michelin-starred restaurants in Europe.”

Much of the rest of the menu will focus on pasta ranging from spaghetti aglio e olio to filled varieties such as ravioli, agnolotti and cappelletti.

“It’s just about mixing them up and making them seasonal, and being generous with flavour and portions,” O’Donoghue says. “Refined Italian, but still gutsy in essence.”

In charge of front-of-house will be Remon van de Kerkhof, who has worked in Michelin-star restaurants such as Restaurant Parkheuvel and De Treeswijkhoeve in the Netherlands, as well as Oncore by Clare Smyth in Sydney, and Sofitel Noosa Pacific Resort.

Van de Kerkhof will be overseeing a wine program that favours hard-to-find Italian vino, alongside classic New World drops. There will also be signature cocktails and a table-side drinks service.

“This is going to add another string to the bow in the Valley,” O’Donoghue says. “We’re in a good spot, with Marty [Boetz] here with [Asian restaurant and food store] Short Grain, and [Italian restaurant] Rosmarino, and [pizza restaurant] Etna right there. It’s little Italy, with a dash of Asian thrown in.”

Establishment 203 will open in mid-November.