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Words and images by Carol Altmann

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] N[/dropcap]ot long into our conversation across a table outside Proudfoots Boathouse, Christopher Grace lights a second cigarette and leans in: “I realise I fucked up”.

The celebrated south-west chef, who has worked at just about every top restaurant in the region, is not talking about stuffing it up with food, but his first love – art.

He is also speaking of a time when he was not Christopher Grace – which is virtually a brand name – but Chris Grace, a gifted art and music student fresh out of Box Hill Tech, who was accepted into the highly competitive photography degree at RMIT university.

He dropped out after two years. Not because the work was beyond him, but because, like for so many uni students, the temptations beyond the tute room proved too great.

“There is a level of self motivation required to succeed at university and I, unfortunately, didn’t have it at that time,” he says with a crooked smile.

What should have been a beginning, became an abrupt ending.

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] C[/dropcap]hristopher left art behind and, like local counterpart Ryan Sessions, fell into cooking (by taking a job at a takeaway joint near the call centre where he was working) and realised he had a knack for the chemistry of food.

His career as a chef has been stellar, including 14 years in the south-west working at celebrated restaurants including the Royal Mail, Merrijig Inn, Portofinos, Basalt and in his current role as manager of Proudfoots but now, at the age of 36, there is a stirring.

“I quit the booze for a while about 18 months ago and had a realisation that I was never going to be content unless I had another crack at photography,” he says.

The only problem was, the world had moved on and digital images and Photoshop had all but replaced film and darkrooms.

“I didn’t own or know how to use a digital camera, and I didn’t want to,” Christopher says.

“For me, it is still about film. Film is really important to me because you make decisions, you control the process, you have an intent and it is so much more rewarding than holding up a computer and letting it take the photo for you.”

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] A[/dropcap] friend sold Christopher his Nikon F4 film camera, a heavy, full-metal-jacket unit built to withstand a war zone.

Christopher carted the beast across Bali and shot four rolls of precious film with 36 shots per roll. The results are framed and waiting for a wall in his home, where we pick up the conversation.

” I got about 30 images that I really like,” he says, pulling a selection from the pile.

They remind me of photos from the 70s: pre-Photoshop, natural, muted tones, and strangely captivating for this very reason.

“The images have scratches, burn marks, finger prints and some have been developed in old developing fluid, which has created its own effect. They are imperfect and that is the whole point,” Christopher says, his voice animated.

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] P[/dropcap]art of the appeal of both cooking and photography to Christopher is that they both rely on rules: what works, what doesn’t.

But while he says he “likes rules”, he also likes to bend if not break them.

As Christopher shows me his portfolio of work, which includes photography, collage and spray painted art works, it is hard to tell what is a photo, what is a drawing, and what is a painting. And that, again, is the whole point.

“I will take a photo and hand colour it with pencils or Textas, so it is no longer looks like a photo, but a drawing – but it is still a photograph,” he explains, smiling at the deliberate confusion he creates.

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] I[/dropcap]t is all about the freedom to experiment, explore and maybe even occasionally fuck up, and in this I get a sense Christopher is rediscovering a freedom that no longer exists for him in cooking where, in a smartphone world, food has become an obsession and everyone is a critic.

So while Christopher has set a goal to create 52 art works in 52 weeks – and is on track – he is ambivalent about an exhibition.

“I would love to have a small exhibition, but I am not sure if anybody would come and that doesn’t bother me, because I don’t need other people judging my work when I already judge myself so harshly,” he says.

If any proof was needed of that fact, look no further than the letters on Christopher’s spare bedroom, where much of his art is stored: MONASA.

“The Museum of New and Shit Art,” he laughs.

Complement this story with…

 

Diving deep into an ocean of risk: Peter Condon

The Stag starts a new chapter in Sessions

Developing a passion for vintage cameras

A life behind the lens: Jack Wilkins

Revealing the eye of the tiger: Peter Clayfield

By Carol Altmann

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] T[/dropcap]he headline for a Trip Advisor review about The Stag restaurant in Port Fairy says it all: Ryan Sessions is back!

For chef Ryan and partner Kirstyn, the decision to take over The Stag (1847) in March this year meant a return to the town where it all began, and where they enjoyed their greatest success.

The pair was widely known for their transformation of the Merrijig Inn, Port Fairy, which they took over in 2006 and raised to a level that saw the restaurant awarded one hat in its first year and two in its second. It was also named the best restaurant in country Victoria.

It was an extraordinary achievement for a young couple who grew up and trained in south-west Victoria, with Kirstyn having been born in Koroit and Ryan moving to Warrnambool from New Zealand as a child.

The pair met when Ryan started working as a young chef at Clovelly Restaurant, in Warrnambool, having finished his apprenticeship with the now-defunct Mahogony Ship Restaurant at Flagstaff Hill.

“It was really there (at Clovelly), that we started to really understand and appreciate food and wine and how they could work together,” Ryan explains.

Prior to that, he confesses, he wasn’t particularly passionate about cooking.

“At school, I was much better in the arts subjects, but I wanted a job where I could go surfing in the morning,” Ryan recalls with a laugh.

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] R[/dropcap]yan’s flair with food saw him picked up by the celebrated Portofino’s in Port Fairy, at that time run by Andrew and Shane Clancey and considered the top restaurant in the area.

But it was only a matter of time, of course, until the Sessions wanted to run a restaurant of their own – and the Merrijig Inn beckoned.

“It was fabulous, but it was also exhausting,” says Kirstyn. “Seven days a week, working at that level, it takes its toll.”

In 2011, the pair offered the business to top chef Tanya Connellan and partner Liz Foreman who, wait for it, had previously run The Stag.

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“The idea was for us to get out of hospitality altogether, because we felt it had all got too much,” Ryan says.

The hospitality industry, however, had other ideas.

After starting “a 12-month break” that was to last only eight months, Ryan was offered head chef with the exclusive The Argus Dining Room, at Hepburn Springs.

Unfortunately things didn’t quite go to plan and he resigned after just four months in what he says was an “amicable” departure.

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] T[/dropcap]he Sessions returned to the south-west and, as Kirstyn explains, did a “whole lot of different things” including her working for Oscar’s Waterfront Boutique hotel in Port Fairy and Ryan helping out in the kitchen at various pubs.

“Did the patrons have any idea who was cooking their schnitzel?” I ask.

“No,” he laughs.

Patrons of The Stag, however, certainly know who is in charge and word has spread rapidly about the dynamic, bush-food based menu and all-Australian wine list.

Indeed, despite being open for only six months, the revamped restaurant was last month awarded one hat by The Age Good Food Guide.

And here Kirstyn tells me something I didn’t know: hats are awarded not just for the food, but “for the whole experience from the minute you walk in the door to the moment you leave”.

This means food, wine list, ambience, front-of-house (Kirstyn’s domain) and even the quality of glassware and cutlery.

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] I[/dropcap]t is The Stag menu, however, that has gastronomes gasping.

Ryan sources all of his ingredients from within Australia and as close to home as possible, which includes foraging along the Port Fairy coast and using small-quantity producers such as Shaw River Buffalo Cheese (Yambuk), South Seas Abalone (Portland) and Great Ocean Ducks (Port Campbell).

“We also have a strong emphasis on using indigenous ingredients – plants, fruits and berries – and taking food back to what it was,” Ryan says.

And with that Kirstyn offers me a sample of ice plant – it is succulent and salty, and grown at Kingston, South Australia. While I will leave a full food review to those far more experienced than me, this one taste is enough to make me want to try the whole menu.

“Australia has a definite cuisine, but we are still discovering it,” Ryan says.

“There are 20,000 edible plants, for example, so we are really just touching the tip of the iceberg.”

[box]The Stag, 22 Sackville St, Port Fairy, is open for dinner only Tuesday- Saturday. Bookings: (03) 55 68 3229[/box]

You might also enjoy…

 

Finding the ‘sauce’ of good food at Merrijig Inn

Making food music at Piccolo

Buffalo cheese a Shaw thing

The great free-range egg hunt

CLOSED – WINNER ANNOUNCED IN JULY 19 EDITION

[dropcap style=”font-size: 60px; color: #A02F2F;”] W[/dropcap]e like to reward our loyal subscribers for the enormous part they play in making sure Bluestone Magazine keeps going and growing.

This time, we are offering our subscribers the chance to win a night in a king suite at the historic and gorgeous Merrijig Inn, Port Fairy, together with an $80 voucher toward dinner in the sublime Merrijig Kitchen.

The first 50 subscribers to email us at editor@bluestonemagazine.com.au with the answer to this question will go in the draw: “What are first names of the two women who run the Merrijig?”

To help you out, here is a link to our earlier story on the owners.

Thankyou to the Merrijig, who are supporters of Bluestone Magazine, for helping us to offer this fantastic prize.

Are you not a subscriber yet? What are you waiting for? Join us here for $85 a full year.