Turnip CheckIn #72 is Zackary Furst, head chef, Bar Liberty and winner of Good Food, Young Chef of the Year Award Victoria 2022.

Amenity waste; it’s a thing. We all chat about food waste in restaurants and cafes but what about amenity waste… Toilet paper, hand soaps, hand towels and/or dryers, do restaurant have access to  products that can help them cut down on amenity waste.

Baresop is a plant-based powder that, with the simple addition of water, makes a hand soap. It’s  delivered with a good looking bottle-to-keep in which to mix the foaming hand soap.

Last year, saw Megan Griffey and chef Jenna Abbruzzese, business partners and owners of Hawthorn cafe Our Kitchenette, make the permanent change from a cafe to retail and ready-made meals, online and in-store.

The pair have stocked the shop with fresh meals prepared by Jenna as well as beautiful tableware and ceramics, selected by Megan. The change has been embraced by  their regulars and broader community and their catering arm is going strong, so we checked in to see how they’re going as they reopened this week to kick off 2021.

Scarf Community partners with restaurants and other hospitality businesses to run Scarf Dinners and provide meaningful training, mentoring and paid work experience to their participants who are from refugee and migrant backgrounds. 

So what happened in this – their 10th year – when those restaurants and business had to shut due to COVID lockdowns? 

We checked in with Scarf Co-founder, Hannah Brennan to see how she’s going. Things are looking up and  there’s some magnificent merch available for purchase  to help support this dynamic organisation, thanks to a collaboration with Melbourne-based Ethiopian artist, Olana Janfa.

Victorian winemakers, Matt & Lentil Purbrick of Minimum Wines, have been in Italy for just about all of 2020,  making wines and getting their heads around the world we now find ourselves in.

We checked in to see how they’re going.

Michael and Christian Dal Zotto of Dal Zotto Wines in the King Valley are working through 2020 as best they can and slowly coming out the other side feeling strong.  The family-owned business and Australian Prosecco pioneers base the culture of their operation on their team and customers. So, while having to change the way they do business, they are also learning a helluva lot. One thing that hasn’t changed? Their people are everything. 

We checked in to see what’s happening.

Julian Hills,  chef and owner of award-winning Navi Restaurant in Yarraville is looking forward to welcoming diners back into his  small  dining room in November. 

Like everyone, he’s had a hard year trying to find balance, support his staff and find other revenue streams, including Navi Bakery that sold out every  weekend it was operating. 

We checked in to see how he’s going. 

Chef Paul Cooper is a doer. 

When restrictions set in earlier this year, the chef/owner of Bianchet Bistro and Providore in the Yarra Valley set about developing ideas he’d been considering for a while and he has established Yarra Valley Ketchup & Pies and Progress Food (a whole food meal business inspired by his own recovery after a bicycle accident six years ago). As  these both simmer away slowly, he’s also focussing on getting the Bistro and Providore back open to a hungry dining audience. 

We checked in to see how it’s all  going. 

Andrew and Mary White have owned and operated much-loved CBD cafe, Cafe e  Torta in the Royal Arcade for 20 years (this year!) as well as tea house, Royal St Collins. 

As plans to celebrate the 20 birthday had to be postponed in light of COVID-19, the couple are remaining positive and hoping – cautiously – for a bright future and a CBD buzzing once more. 

2020 has handed winemakers Tessa  Brown and Jeremy Schmölzer – of VIGNERONS SCHMÖLZER AND BROWN in Beechworth – an unusual combination of factors. 

They welcomed their second child – beautiful! – but the summer bushfires brought about the complete loss of their first significant crop from their own vineyard, and most of the other Beechworth and King Valley fruit they typically source. 

They were forced to secure a reduced harvest of parcels from other Victorian wine regions in early January. And then along came the cessation of on-premise sales due to the Covid-19 shutdowns in March. This benched probably 70% of their turnover and shifted our focus sharply to retail and website sales.

We thought we’d checkin to see how they’re going. 

As Mornington Peninsula is considered part of Melbourne Metro area, like us in the city, they’re only just seeing a little light at the end of the COVID tunnel.

We checked in with Karen Golding, who with her husband David (pictured), owns and operates the much-loved Red Hill Brewery. 

Coskun Uysal, chef and co-owner of award-winning restaurant Tulum in Balaclava has – like everyone in hospitality – had to question the intention and purpose of his business. It was bloody hard. He contemplated, and came up with a solution that’s working for him and his team, for now. But he does have plans to take Tulum back to its original focus when life and restrictions allow. 

Despite some health issues and a couple  of days in hospital, we checked in to see how he’s recovering. It’s all good, he’s readying himself for a positive future. 

Chef Paul Wilson and his wife Bec, moved to the Mornington Peninsula from Melbourne in 2019 to work with the team at Morgan’s Sorrento. Then along came 2020… 

We checked in with Paul who is adapting his life and the business to this new world we all find ourselves in. 

Despite also having to deal with sad news from the UK – where he grew up – he finds there’s still a lot to look forward to. 

Chef Alejandro Saravia, of Pastuso in Melbourne and UMA in Perth, planned to open his new venue, Farmers Daughters at 80 Collins St in early 2020…

We checked in with him to see what the plans are for the new venue and how he, his family and his teams are going.

We checked in with Mauro Callegari, chef/owner of The Independent in Gembrook who has received great support from his local community.

We spoke with MoVida co-owner and chef Frank Camorra a few days ago and after the announcements today of extended lockdown and gradual easing of restrictions, this is as relevant as ever. The challenges do keep coming, stay well Melbourne. 

Carlton’s Heart Attack & Vine, the small cafe/winebar/place we love is part of the Turnip Media family. It’a a local for us.

We’re missing them and thought we’d check in to see how co-owner Nathen Doyle and his team are going.

Popular Anglesea restaurant, Captain Moonlite closed in early March. It turned out to be a positive for owners, Chef Matt Germanchis and Gemma Gange who put their focus in their takeaway business Fish by Moonlite. We checked in to see how they’re going and how their lives have changed, for the better.

Chef Guy Grossi is a friend of Turnip Media. He and his family have poured so much energy and culture into Melbourne’s dining scene at Grossi Florentino, The Grill, The Cellar Bar, Ombra and Arlechin, we had to check in and see how he’s going and find out more about is delivery and takeaway business, Grossi a Casa. 

Award-winning winemaker, Steve Flamsteed, head winemaker of Yarra Valley’s Giant Steps and his own label – Salo – has kept his team busy with pruning and replanting in anticipation of the next vintage. 

We checked in to chat about what he’s missing, what’s he enjoying and what he’s learned during COVID. 

Vegetable farmers, Oliver and Lisa Shorthouse were hospitality professionals for years – Oliver was General Manager of Andrew McConnell’s restaurant group (now known as The Trader House Restaurants ) and Lisa was Andrew’s PA – before they moved to the Dandenong Ranges to establish Ramarro Farm. They grow a diverse range of fresh produce and the industry was the bulk of their business, until March, so we’ve checked in to see how they’re going.

Mass gatherings, events, festivals…what will they look like in a post-COVID-19 world? We chat to Vanessa Briody and Kate Kirkpatrick, Directors of award-winning annual Grampians Grape Escape to get a snapshot of what they’re managing, at the moment and into the future.

Long a respected and hardworking figure in the Melbourne hospo world, Angie Giannakodakis
co-owner of Epocha in Carlton and Camberwell’s Elyros had a chat to us about where she and her teams are at, at the moment.

Menu Community Kitchen Kind Edible Futures Hospo Check-in Turnip Table Clients Contact Mike Baker and Daniel Mason Henry Sugar Bar – Carlton North We checked

Menu Community Kitchen Kind Edible Futures Hospo Check-in Turnip Table Clients Contact Shane Delia Maha Group The first Hospo CheckIn was on March 21, the