Our Food Obsession Has Gone Too Far

Matthew Evans is a former chef and food critic turned Tasmanian smallholder. He fattens pigs, milks a cow, tends a garden and writes about food from his office atop his cottage on Puggle Farm, in the gorgeous Huon Valley. He is also the author of nine books on food, including the authoritative Real Food Companion, his autobiography Never Order Chicken on a Monday, and the recently co-authored Gourmet Farmer Deli Book.

He writes regularly for Feast magazine, and is setting up a 70 acre piece of land as a mixed farm under the name Fat Pig Farm, specialising in old and rare breed pork. He recently finished filming the third series of the SBS television series Gourmet Farmer, which will air on SBS on 14th March 2013.

Matthew’s other project is A Common Ground, an artisan Tasmanian foodstore he co-owns with Nick Haddow, which also specialises in regional produce events.

Richard Cornish is an award-winning food writer who penned the much loved and irreverent Fairfax Media column Brain Food for more than seven years. He has co-authored the bestselling MoVida cookbooks with Frank Camorra, and Phillippa’s Home Baking with Phillippa Grogan. My Year Without Meat was published by MUP in 2016.

Katy led SecondBite as CEO from 2006 to 2012. Together with founders Ian and Simone Carson, Katy led SecondBite through a period of intense growth and expansion on an unprecedented scale, from collecting around 600kg of fresh produce in 2005 to redistributing over two million kilograms in 2012 to 400+ community food programs in Victoria, Tasmania, Queensland, WA and NSW.

Katy left her position as CEO in September 2012 to develop and establish Spade & Barrow, a social business that aims to purchase Natures Grade produce (think wonky carrots and pink lady apples that are slightly the wrong shade of pink) and distribute it wholesale to the public sector, food enterprises and community organisations. Her aim is to put value back into the food system by compensating farmers fairly for fabulous fresh produce that would otherwise not be harvested, whilst providing affordable fresh nutritious food wholesale to the public and community sector.

Katy joined the non-profit sector18 years ago working for Children in Crisis with the Duchess of York. She worked for SCOPE, Colon Cancer Concern, Trinity Hospice and led a fundraising campaign for the relief of Poverty for Children in Afghanistan that funded a Street Child clinic for 3 years. Katy was also the Marketing Director of Corporate Catering Company, then the largest independent pub company in SE England. On arrival in Australia in 1981, Katy started up Eye Marketing, creating identities for bars and clubs in Melbourne and owned her own hospitality venue where she was constantly appalled at the waste.

Katy was awarded the Tattersall’s Enterprise & Achievement Award in July 2008 and was selected by The Age as one of Melbourne’s 100 Most Influential people. SecondBite received the Lord Mayor’s Melbourne Award 2008 for Contribution to Community and the 2010 Premier’s Sustainability Award, Office for Community Development’s Innovation Award and prestigious 2010 Banksia Community Award. In 2011, Katy was awarded the Stanford Australia Foundation’s Scholarship for Not for Profit Leaders and completed Stanford University’s Executive Program in Social Entrepreneurship. Katy sits on the SecondBite Board, the Fundraising committee and the Corporate Partnerships Committees, and is a Director of Spade & Barrow.

Alla Wolf-Tasker is the executive chef and co-proprietor of Daylesford dining stalwart Lake House. In 2007, she was named a Member of the Order of Australia for her service to Tourism and Hospitality.

An icon in regional dining, Lake House has long been considered to be one of Australia’s best restaurants, championing local seasonal cuisine long before it became a mantra for many. The hotel and all manner of indulgent facilities that have grown around the restaurant over the past three decades continue to delight visitors from near and far.

Alla Wolf-Tasker has enough national and international awards to fill virtually every wall of her fabled house on the lake. Recent accolades for the restaurant and hotel include listing in Tatler London’s Top 100 hotels in the world, listing in The Australian’s Hottest 50 Restaurants and Australia’s top hotel dining room from Gourmet Traveller magazine.

As a roving ambassador of sorts, Alla participates in food festivals all around the world, also spreading her message of the importance of reconnecting with our food and its provenance. She is probably happiest nowadays in gumboots in the paddock of one of the local farms that supply Lake House, or overseeing the production of some bespoke traditional smallgoods.

At Lake House, she remains at the helm of a team of creative and dedicated young chefs and hospitality professionals.

Amongst Alla’s many personal awards are the title of ‘Living Legend’ from the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival, the Award for Professional Excellence from The Age Good Food Guide and a Lifetime Achiever Award from Australia’s Restaurant and Caterer’s Association. In 2012 she was given The Age Good Food Guide Legend Award for her contribution to the hospitality industry.

Alla’s book, Lake House – A Culinary Journey in Country Australia, was published by Hardie Grant in 2006.

Dr Simon Longstaff is Executive Director of St James Ethics Centre and chairs the Intelligence Squared debates in Sydney and Melbourne.

Simon Longstaff spent five years studying and working as a member of Magdalene College, Cambridge, before returning to Australia in mid-1991. Having won scholarships to study at Cambridge, he read for the degrees of Master of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy.His research centred on related questions arising in the areas of political philosophy, ethics and the philosophy of education.

Dr Longstaff was inaugural president of The Australian Association for Professional and Applied Ethics and is a Director of a number of companies. He is a Fellow of the World Economic Forum and a member of its Global Agenda Council. Publications include, Hard Cases, Tough Choices and numerous articles.

Fuchsia Dunlop was the first Westerner to train at the Sichuan Higher Institute of Cuisine, and has been travelling around China collecting recipes for nearly two decades.

Fuchsia writes for the Financial Times, the New Yorker and the Observer, among others. Her previous books include the award-winning Sichuan Cookery and Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper.

Wendy Harmer is one of Australia’s most versatile entertainers – broadcaster, author, journalist and stage performer – and is the editor-in-chief of The Hoopla, a daily online news and magazine website. She was a contestant in Celebrity Masterchef in 2009.

As a stand-up comedian she performed her one-woman shows at the Melbourne, Edinburgh, Montreal and Glasgow Mayfest Comedy Festivals, in London’s West End and the Sydney Theatre Company. Wendy enjoyed huge popularity leading Sydney radio station 2Day FM’s top-rating breakfastshow for 11 years. She has hosted, written and appeared in a variety of TV shows including ABC TV’s The Big Gig.

A former political journalist, Wendy is the author of eight books for adults, including her bestselling novel Farewell My Ovaries, Love and Punishment and Nagging for Beginners, a how-to guide for women. Her latest novel Friends Like These was published in April 2011.

Wendy still works as a radio broadcaster for the ABC. She has been a columnist for the Good Weekend, the Sunday Telegraph and many magazines.