July 12, 2026 • 23 mins
Backed by more than two decades of elite global experience, Paul recently made history. Essence, located in Queenstown, was named the sole two-star establishment in the country's first ever Michelin Guide.
Paul has also enjoyed stints at legendary two Michelin star hubs in Singapore and Hong Kong as well as working out a decade long legacy as Executive Chef at Huka Lodge.
Tune in to hear of his incredible journey from a kid dreaming of Michelin kitchens to reaching the pinnacle of New Zealand's dining scene, his passion for wild foraging, and why making history won't change a single thing about how he runs his kitchen.
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
You're listening to a podcast from News Talks be follow
this and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Paul is the director of Culinary at the Rocky, a
collection which operates the restaurant Essence in Queenstown, and Essence
is the only New Zealand restaurant to receive the two
star award at Oceania's first mitchelland Guide Awards recently. Welcome
and congratulations.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Paul, Thank you very much, honest, it's a great honor
to be talking to you and sharing this moment.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Well, the honors all yours at the moment. You've got
the stars to prove it, and it must be quite
a buzz because I know over your working career you've
worked at the restaurants of mitchelland Stars. Now you can
say you've earned your own.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yes, correct, Like I said multiple times, it's an honor
for us. It's been a while. Win forty eight hours
now we're into a little bit more. It just hasn't
stopped it. The feet haven't touched the ground. It's truly
an unbelievable accomplishment to be recognized after so long in.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
The industry and how long in the industry have you been,
so I started.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
I was about thirteen years old when I started. A
family friend had a bed and breakfast, so that was
the first kind of taste of hospitality for me. I
was introduced to that, and then I got a job
in a professional kitchen as a kitchen han and washing dishes,
and I was inspired to kind of hurry up and
peel the carrots, which was the the chef. So if
(01:33):
you hurry up and do your pots and pans, then
you can go on to other things.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
And that's where it kind of started.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Now, there was lots of chefs that end up, say
working on a ship or working for a mining company
in the back blocks or something, feeding people or something,
and they're probably doing worthy jobs. How is it that
you managed to steer your course into this elite zone
of cuisine? Did you deliberately decide yes, that's the direction
(02:01):
I want to take my cooking.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
There wasn't a deliberate decision that. There was a few
decisions that were made, and there was a flip of
the coin that also helped the decision get made. First
of all, I was very fortunate studied catering and catering
school and I was directed by one of my lecturers
into my first job, which was a one Mishion Star
restaurants as qualified chef, which was amazing.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
It was the first.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
It was the introduction into the world of that culinary
status of Michelin Stars. And I'll never forget the chef
said to me when I got employed on my first
pure day in the kitchen. It was like, whatever you've
learned Atktering School, forget it. It's not applicable. It's start
from scratch. And I was devastated. And for me that
(02:46):
was that was the biggest thing. I was just like, Wow,
I spent three years at Ktering School and this big
chef has just told me to forget everything. But literally
everything I'd learned, I didn't need to practice it. We
relearned a new skill, were a new way to be
was how it was started. And then, to be honest
with you, John, I saw a picture in a book
(03:07):
way back when I was probably about eighteen years old
of a beautiful plate of food and I said, I
want to cook food like that. Little did I know
that the chef that cooked that food was a two
mission star chef, one of the best in England at
the time. And I wrote my resume, which was, you know,
five lines less saying Hey, I'm a younger, I'd love
to work for you. And he saw something in me.
(03:29):
He said yep, let's go. And that's that's how it began.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Wow, Well, tell me a bit about the Michellan system.
I know it from car tires. I actually had a
couple on a field so many years ago. But and
I remember a bloated and flated guy that sort of
sits up and deflates. But I don't think there's got
too much to do with the restaurant trade. Can you
(03:53):
get what is this Michelin.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
The mission star system?
Speaker 3 (03:57):
It was. It was a guide that created many many
years ago in France. They created they want obviously wanted
to sell tires, so Misston wanted to sell tires. So
they created this guidebook distinctions of restaurants so that they
and they say in their quotes, were for journey, where
for detour, Exceptional cuisine where for a different thing. So
(04:17):
they created this guide of restaurants in France so that
people could go to different places and use their tires.
And then it grew into this phenomenal accolade reward system
that it is today.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Okay, and it's international.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
International, it's international and growing.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Right, and does it actually shape people's dining choices? I mean,
if you know, if my local newspaper gave you two stars,
that would probably be very nice, but I don't think
it would probably steer too many people to your restaurant.
But obviously this makes a difference. It's made a difference already.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Yes, it's made a difference already. It's international recognition for us.
You know, like the Booking Engine, it was literally like
a light switch, it just exploded overnight.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
You know.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
The the magnitude of the Micheland Guide and Mischland Stars
on the World platform is just is an amazing, amazing thing.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Okay, So I remember hearing the Minister of Tourism or
something saying that this was going to be good for
the country, that people would actually come to New Zealand
to eat at these restaurants with Mitcheland stares. Is this true?
I mean, are there actually I do guesstro tourists really exist?
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yes, I'll raise my hand, I'm one of them. I go, well,
I want I want to go to a place. I
look to where to eat, I don't look to what
it's all about. Where can I go to eat and
then okay, we'll go and visit. So yeah, I'd like
to hope that it will bring the international guests to
visit our shorts.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Okay, So growing up and you were working in the
bed and breakfast industry and then moving on to catering
stool school, you worked at a couple of restaurants in Britain,
but then you moved elsewhere.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Yes, so I was very fortunate.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
So, like I said, I worked for a two mission
star chef in England. That was my second professional job,
and I got to a point in his kitchen where
I was like, Okay, what do I do next. You know,
I've been around all the whole kitchen. I've learned the
whole kitchen, and I've learned the whole philosophy. I spent
about two and a half years with him, and he
was like, you need to move to France because back then,
(06:34):
you know, great chefs went to France because that's where
the heritage is and where it all began.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
So I moved to France.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
I went to work in a three mission star restaurant
in France, a very famous chef at the time. Unfortunately,
he committed suicide. He was one of the chefs that
committed suicide because there was this talk of him losing
his three mission stars. There was a lot of other
things around it, but there was this big talk about him.
His name was Bernard lash So I moved to France
for two and a half years, and then I decided
(07:04):
that maybe I needed a change again. And I had
two opportunities, and I was go back to England to
go to London, excuse me, or go to Singapore. And
I spoke to a lot of my friends and all
of my colleagues, and I was like, I don't know
what to do. They're both great opportunities, and no one
gave me that clear sign of where I should go.
So one day I basically flipped a coin. I was
(07:26):
stood outside the kitchen and I flipped a coin to
make that decision for me, because I couldn't make it
on my own. And I flipped it. And Singapore came up,
and I packed up. I took a carry on suitcase
with three knives, and I.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Bought three lines, three knives, three knives with me.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
I moved into Singapore with a with an idea of
working in a restaurant and doing it for a year.
And then moving around the world and heading back home
at some.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Point, and you're still waiting for that move back home.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
I'm still I'm still on that if am I going
to get there kind of style.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
So what was what was your career like? And it
was a very different working in Asia. You talked about
France being sort of like the capital, the place where
the culture of fine cuisine cooking originated. Did it translate
into something different in the Asian context?
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Yes, it changed a lot. You know Asia is it
was for me? From my experience, it was a very
humbling experience. I really understood that there's a lot of
you know, you need to be quite humble in Asia.
You know, it's a different way of life. They're different
kinds of people. So it's just learning that way and
(08:47):
being a bit different and being a bit open minded
to it.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
Okay, how do you mean the humility that the humble
I sort of like when you said that, I sort
of had envisions these prima donna chefs that are shouting
and yelling around the kitchen and have to be bowed
down to everything. Is that. I don't know if you
even know that's true or if that's just a TV exaggeration.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Sorry, I never worked for a chef like that. You know,
I never had the you need to praise the chef. Yes,
you respected chef, and yes chef was chef, But I
never had the yelling or the screaming or the shouting.
We got told off when we did something wrong, of course,
but and it was a firm telling off, but it
(09:33):
was purely because of you know, when we wanted to learning,
we wanted to be better.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
So it's it's just that kind of you know.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
And then in Singapore and Hong Kong is understanding and
appreciating the team and you know, bringing the team up
with you. It's it's I'm not a one man show.
There's you know, there's a whole team behind me. And
there was a whole team in Asia that I learned
was like, oh, hold on a minute. You know, they're
as good as they need to be, as good as me,
right for me to succeed.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
In your acceptance speatures with the habitulant stars that you
were ordered, you alluded very much to your team. Yes,
and so do you think this is something of that
culture that you absorbed back there in Singapore and Hong Kong.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
I believe so yeah, it is very much a team
It's a team game, you know, Football's football is a
team game.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
It's the team that wins. It's the same as cooking.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
If one guy's let me down and he doesn't pass
the ball correctly, then we don't succeed. So it's very
much that team sport, you know, and having everyone around
you on the same trajectory as you are and the
same vision that you are, then you will succeed.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
And it'd be interesting to see their trajectories too. So
if you've just joined us, my guest tonight is a
Paul Froget who's just recently his restaurant's been awarded two
Mitchellin stars and I'm just talking a bit more about
his story, his background, how do you get to be
a top chieft like this? And I'll be back with
him in just a few minutes. This is real life
(10:59):
on news Talk ZEDB.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Intelligent interviews with interesting people. It's real life on Newstalk ZEDB.
Speaker 4 (11:10):
Stars.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
Welcome back to real life. I'm John Cown talking with
Paul Frogget, who's an internationally celebrated chef. What he is
now because he's got two Michellin stars and to be
able to put on his restaurant down in Queenstown. Essence,
and you've chosen some music for us. What have been
what have we been listening to? There?
Speaker 4 (11:43):
So that's the.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Sky through the Stars so I can spit it out.
Then it's the song very close to my heart and
then my family's high. It's the first concert that we
attended after my wife's breast cancer treatment in New Zealand,
so it's it's very close to our hearts as a
as a unit, as a family. And now those stars
have literally shined down on us and aligned for us
(12:09):
to have the two miss stars that we.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
That we picked up right now, that sounds like a
very significant chapter in your family's life. If your wife
went through brist cancer treatment, I hope it's been going
well and she's in a good remission.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
Yes, it's perfect. She's ten years remission. This year is
ten years. So it's very significant for us that these
stars have now come come and lined and dropped and
dropped for me, dropped for the restaurant, drop for us.
It is like I said earlier, it's a family. It's
a team effort. It's also a family effort.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
Right for everyone. Family did you start your family when
you're in Asia. Is that part of the move to
to that part of the world that coincided with an
expansion of your family status.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
It wasn't in the flip of the coin of moving
to Singapore, But yes, that's you know.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
I ended up.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
I flipped the coin. I moved to Singapore. I ended
up spending five and a half years in Singapore. I
met a young lady. She now is the mother of
my two children and my wife. And that was the
reason that Asia played such a significant role.
Speaker 4 (13:18):
You know.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
With me, right, I know she is somewhat passionate about
harnessing nutrition in the maintenance of her health and her
recovery from breast cancer. Has she taken you on that
journey as well? Is there something that you collaborate on
and the idea of food contributing to health.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
Yes, we went on a very big journey with it.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
We explored many options and tried the whole No sugar.
Speaker 4 (13:46):
I gave up sugar, not because of her, but with her.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
I gave up dairy in my home life, not because
of her, but with her. So yeah, it's changed me
and being open minded to these kind of options I
think is great you know, is.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Any of that translated into your menu choices.
Speaker 4 (14:09):
We don't cook with a lot of dairy. You know.
Speaker 3 (14:12):
There is some cream, and there is a little bit.
I do like butter, but it's not heavy, it's not rich.
I personally can't eat it if it's like that, So hand,
I don't want to.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Cook by that.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Okay, you've got children. How many kids have you got? So?
Speaker 3 (14:27):
I have two children, sixteen and my daughter is thirteen.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
Right, I'm just sort of wondering. I know that being
a chef can be a very very high stress business.
And you talked before about the chef that you worked
with in the restaurant in France that obviously the stress
was too much for him. Family life is stressful. Having
a wife of cancer is stressful. How do you balance
(14:53):
all these things? I mean, your time zone that you
work in is so out of kilter with the time
zone that the family's work in. How do you balance
all this? You obviously do because you still thriving as
a family.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
Yes, to be honest with you, John, it's a lot
of hard work on all parts of the family. You know,
my wife often mentions to friends that she's the chef widow.
You know, she goes to parties and I'm cooking, or
she will go to things and I'm cooking. But it's
making the time and making sure that you're present, you know.
I have days off and I'm allocated to the family
(15:30):
time when I'm home. I'm home, I try not to work,
I try not to look at things. I do gravitate
to food. I am very interested in food. So a
lot of things are rather around food at.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
The dinner table.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
So we have a lot, we have a lot of
conversations at the dinner table. We sit down probably for
maybe two and a half hours for dinner when I'm
at home and we talk. That's that's our talking time.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
What time does your working day finish?
Speaker 4 (15:59):
About eleven pm?
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Eleven pm, so you're probably not probably an early rise
of then. It does put you out of sync with
your kids and family life.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
It does a little bit. I've I do. I've made
that I need to make the conscious effort to be up.
I'm up at about seven thirty, quarter to eight, just
so that i can get a little bit of time
with them before they go after school, you know, and
I'll drop them at school. I walk I walked to
the high school with my with my with my daughter
when she was at the school down the road. Just
(16:30):
to try nice, yeah, just to try and make that
that change and just make the connection with them rather
than our dad's sleeping or dos at work.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Right, And I was just wondering, what do you do
with the time that you're on your own? Then you've
got time off during the day. Do you do you
go fishing? Do you go walking? Do you just sit
down and experiment with cooking? How do you spend your
time during the day before you have to head off
to work.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
So there's a funny story there, John. I when we
moved to New Zealand, I didn't have any hobbies. I
was a man of very little time, of very little hobbies.
And it was my wife again, who's who suggested I
took up a hobby. And I did something a little
bit different. And I had a good friend of good
(17:16):
family friends who and I said to I need, I
need a hobby.
Speaker 4 (17:18):
What should I do?
Speaker 3 (17:19):
You know?
Speaker 4 (17:19):
I'm like, I'm like fly fishing or golf.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
And he said to me, take up fly fishing because
you're still fit and you can still get out there
and do it. So I immersed myself into fly fishing, and
I spent the past, you know what, probably eight years
putting as much effort into my cooking as I now
do into my fly fishing. So for me, fishing and
exploring and tramping is high on my agenda.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
I'm starting to understand now why your restaurants have been
in places like hook Are Lodge down here a good
trout stream and yes, and Queen's Stout and good trout fishing.
Speaker 4 (17:54):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Okay, Actually coming to New Zealand after having been in
these Micheland restaurants and France, England, Hong Kong, Singapore, surely
coming to New Zealand must have seemed like a culinary
backwater and a bit of career suicide. How is it
you decided, okay, let's go to a place with only
(18:15):
four million people and they like fish and chips, you know,
let's go. How did you decide to do that?
Speaker 3 (18:24):
We had a we had a family meeting again the
dinner table, and we decided that. You know, I met
the executive chef from Hooko Lodge in Hong Kong and
he told me that this New Zealand dream story. He
saw me this dream and I was like, wow, it
sounds amazing, and we had a family meeting and we
(18:46):
decided that maybe we needed to put it.
Speaker 4 (18:49):
I needed I needed to put a little.
Speaker 3 (18:51):
Bit more effort into raising children, and we wanted to
raise children in a in a in a safe and
beautiful place.
Speaker 4 (18:57):
We knew that much.
Speaker 3 (18:58):
We didn't know that we'd end up at hook Lodge,
New Zealand, but we knew that we had to change
a little bit. So that was the catalyst for it.
And then yeah, applying to Hooker getting the job at
hook Lodge. The first three years were really tough. The
first week was immensely tough, purely because I couldn't get
(19:20):
coffee after three o'clock. Everything closed on Sundays at lunchtime.
The supermarket closed at five o'clock and I used to
shop at eight o'clock. So it was a real big
culture shop, you know, coming out of Hong Kong into Talpo,
which is beautiful, but there's very little happening.
Speaker 4 (19:38):
It was quite closure shocks for all of us.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
The deceleration could have possibly been almost fatal. Though, fantastic
that you survived it, and think that you survived it
for about ten years.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
I'm so glad that you know, John, it was amazing, amazing,
It was purely amazing.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Right now, you've talked a bit about stars aligning and
flipping coins, and your life seems to have worked out well.
Have you had a sense that there has been a
sort of a hand on your shoulder they're coming through life.
Speaker 4 (20:07):
I the chas is yes.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
I lost my father when I was two and a
half years old, and I was always told by the
people around your family, friends that he was always watching
over me. And so I always had this belief that
there was someone on my shoulder or deep withinside of
me that I could if I really wanted to try
and do it, I'd be able to do it. It
(20:31):
was that belief that kind of got me through everything.
You know, thick thin, and we've had some we've had
some hard times as a family and as a person.
There's hard times to be had, but you know, with
the courage and that belief that you know, we can succeed.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Yeah, that's that's very interesting. Hey, just just just a
final thing. I'm a bit of a novice, a bit
of a newbie when it comes to find dining. And
you can look out in your restaurant, I'm sure you
can see the experienced guestro tourists who you know, who
know everything about what's on the menu and things, and
you probably see the people that have only ever designed,
(21:05):
only ever dined in a restaurant like yours a couple
of times. Is there any advice that you could give
to someone like myself who's a bit of a fine
dining newbie.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Just just enjoy it for the moment. You know, we're
very lucky. People come and they spend you know, two
hours with us, two and a half hours of us.
Just be really open to it and just really enjoy
what we're trying to do. You know, I want people
to I say, you're in our dining room, I'm cooking,
you're in my house.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
Just enjoy what we do and just be like, yeah,
this is this is what it is.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Okay. So it's an experience more than nutrition, it's entertainment
as well.
Speaker 4 (21:45):
It's a journey. It's a journey, John, it's a journey.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Well, thanks for sharing some of the journey that you've
been on, and I wish you all the best. I mean,
you're already celebrating your two stars. You can get another one,
can't you? Is there going to be the goal you
get it through you.
Speaker 4 (22:00):
Can get It's a dream. Let's put it that way.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Okay, Well you need you need your new dream. Now
I have to reach this stream. It's been great talking
with you. I've been speaking with Paul Frogget, who's a
two star Michellan Star winner down in uh down in
Queenstown and pets. Look forward to dining with you sometime.
Thank you for taking time to be on real life.
Thank you, this is real life. I'm John Cown. Looking
(22:24):
forward to being back with you again next Sunday night.
Speaker 5 (22:29):
M seer see Funny Sail seem.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
To come out
Speaker 1 (23:23):
For more from News Talks at b Listen live on
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Speaker 2 (00:17):
Paul is the director of Culinary at the Rocky, a
collection which operates the restaurant Essence in Queenstown, and Essence
is the only New Zealand restaurant to receive the two
star award at Oceania's first mitchelland Guide Awards recently. Welcome
and congratulations.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
Paul, Thank you very much, honest, it's a great honor
to be talking to you and sharing this moment.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Well, the honors all yours at the moment. You've got
the stars to prove it, and it must be quite
a buzz because I know over your working career you've
worked at the restaurants of mitchelland Stars. Now you can
say you've earned your own.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yes, correct, Like I said multiple times, it's an honor
for us. It's been a while. Win forty eight hours
now we're into a little bit more. It just hasn't
stopped it. The feet haven't touched the ground. It's truly
an unbelievable accomplishment to be recognized after so long in.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
The industry and how long in the industry have you been,
so I started.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
I was about thirteen years old when I started. A
family friend had a bed and breakfast, so that was
the first kind of taste of hospitality for me. I
was introduced to that, and then I got a job
in a professional kitchen as a kitchen han and washing dishes,
and I was inspired to kind of hurry up and
peel the carrots, which was the the chef. So if
(01:33):
you hurry up and do your pots and pans, then
you can go on to other things.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
And that's where it kind of started.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Now, there was lots of chefs that end up, say
working on a ship or working for a mining company
in the back blocks or something, feeding people or something,
and they're probably doing worthy jobs. How is it that
you managed to steer your course into this elite zone
of cuisine? Did you deliberately decide yes, that's the direction
(02:01):
I want to take my cooking.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
There wasn't a deliberate decision that. There was a few
decisions that were made, and there was a flip of
the coin that also helped the decision get made. First
of all, I was very fortunate studied catering and catering
school and I was directed by one of my lecturers
into my first job, which was a one Mishion Star
restaurants as qualified chef, which was amazing.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
It was the first.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
It was the introduction into the world of that culinary
status of Michelin Stars. And I'll never forget the chef
said to me when I got employed on my first
pure day in the kitchen. It was like, whatever you've
learned Atktering School, forget it. It's not applicable. It's start
from scratch. And I was devastated. And for me that
(02:46):
was that was the biggest thing. I was just like, Wow,
I spent three years at Ktering School and this big
chef has just told me to forget everything. But literally
everything I'd learned, I didn't need to practice it. We
relearned a new skill, were a new way to be
was how it was started. And then, to be honest
with you, John, I saw a picture in a book
(03:07):
way back when I was probably about eighteen years old
of a beautiful plate of food and I said, I
want to cook food like that. Little did I know
that the chef that cooked that food was a two
mission star chef, one of the best in England at
the time. And I wrote my resume, which was, you know,
five lines less saying Hey, I'm a younger, I'd love
to work for you. And he saw something in me.
(03:29):
He said yep, let's go. And that's that's how it began.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Wow, Well, tell me a bit about the Michellan system.
I know it from car tires. I actually had a
couple on a field so many years ago. But and
I remember a bloated and flated guy that sort of
sits up and deflates. But I don't think there's got
too much to do with the restaurant trade. Can you
(03:53):
get what is this Michelin.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
The mission star system?
Speaker 3 (03:57):
It was. It was a guide that created many many
years ago in France. They created they want obviously wanted
to sell tires, so Misston wanted to sell tires. So
they created this guidebook distinctions of restaurants so that they
and they say in their quotes, were for journey, where
for detour, Exceptional cuisine where for a different thing. So
(04:17):
they created this guide of restaurants in France so that
people could go to different places and use their tires.
And then it grew into this phenomenal accolade reward system
that it is today.
Speaker 2 (04:31):
Okay, and it's international.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
International, it's international and growing.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Right, and does it actually shape people's dining choices? I mean,
if you know, if my local newspaper gave you two stars,
that would probably be very nice, but I don't think
it would probably steer too many people to your restaurant.
But obviously this makes a difference. It's made a difference already.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Yes, it's made a difference already. It's international recognition for us.
You know, like the Booking Engine, it was literally like
a light switch, it just exploded overnight.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
You know.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
The the magnitude of the Micheland Guide and Mischland Stars
on the World platform is just is an amazing, amazing thing.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Okay, So I remember hearing the Minister of Tourism or
something saying that this was going to be good for
the country, that people would actually come to New Zealand
to eat at these restaurants with Mitcheland stares. Is this true?
I mean, are there actually I do guesstro tourists really exist?
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yes, I'll raise my hand, I'm one of them. I go, well,
I want I want to go to a place. I
look to where to eat, I don't look to what
it's all about. Where can I go to eat and
then okay, we'll go and visit. So yeah, I'd like
to hope that it will bring the international guests to
visit our shorts.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Okay, So growing up and you were working in the
bed and breakfast industry and then moving on to catering
stool school, you worked at a couple of restaurants in Britain,
but then you moved elsewhere.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
Yes, so I was very fortunate.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
So, like I said, I worked for a two mission
star chef in England. That was my second professional job,
and I got to a point in his kitchen where
I was like, Okay, what do I do next. You know,
I've been around all the whole kitchen. I've learned the
whole kitchen, and I've learned the whole philosophy. I spent
about two and a half years with him, and he
was like, you need to move to France because back then,
(06:34):
you know, great chefs went to France because that's where
the heritage is and where it all began.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
So I moved to France.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
I went to work in a three mission star restaurant
in France, a very famous chef at the time. Unfortunately,
he committed suicide. He was one of the chefs that
committed suicide because there was this talk of him losing
his three mission stars. There was a lot of other
things around it, but there was this big talk about him.
His name was Bernard lash So I moved to France
for two and a half years, and then I decided
(07:04):
that maybe I needed a change again. And I had
two opportunities, and I was go back to England to
go to London, excuse me, or go to Singapore. And
I spoke to a lot of my friends and all
of my colleagues, and I was like, I don't know
what to do. They're both great opportunities, and no one
gave me that clear sign of where I should go.
So one day I basically flipped a coin. I was
(07:26):
stood outside the kitchen and I flipped a coin to
make that decision for me, because I couldn't make it
on my own. And I flipped it. And Singapore came up,
and I packed up. I took a carry on suitcase
with three knives, and I.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Bought three lines, three knives, three knives with me.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
I moved into Singapore with a with an idea of
working in a restaurant and doing it for a year.
And then moving around the world and heading back home
at some.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Point, and you're still waiting for that move back home.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
I'm still I'm still on that if am I going
to get there kind of style.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
So what was what was your career like? And it
was a very different working in Asia. You talked about
France being sort of like the capital, the place where
the culture of fine cuisine cooking originated. Did it translate
into something different in the Asian context?
Speaker 3 (08:25):
Yes, it changed a lot. You know Asia is it
was for me? From my experience, it was a very
humbling experience. I really understood that there's a lot of
you know, you need to be quite humble in Asia.
You know, it's a different way of life. They're different
kinds of people. So it's just learning that way and
(08:47):
being a bit different and being a bit open minded
to it.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
Okay, how do you mean the humility that the humble
I sort of like when you said that, I sort
of had envisions these prima donna chefs that are shouting
and yelling around the kitchen and have to be bowed
down to everything. Is that. I don't know if you
even know that's true or if that's just a TV exaggeration.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Sorry, I never worked for a chef like that. You know,
I never had the you need to praise the chef. Yes,
you respected chef, and yes chef was chef, But I
never had the yelling or the screaming or the shouting.
We got told off when we did something wrong, of course,
but and it was a firm telling off, but it
(09:33):
was purely because of you know, when we wanted to learning,
we wanted to be better.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
So it's it's just that kind of you know.
Speaker 3 (09:41):
And then in Singapore and Hong Kong is understanding and
appreciating the team and you know, bringing the team up
with you. It's it's I'm not a one man show.
There's you know, there's a whole team behind me. And
there was a whole team in Asia that I learned
was like, oh, hold on a minute. You know, they're
as good as they need to be, as good as me,
right for me to succeed.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
In your acceptance speatures with the habitulant stars that you
were ordered, you alluded very much to your team. Yes,
and so do you think this is something of that
culture that you absorbed back there in Singapore and Hong Kong.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
I believe so yeah, it is very much a team
It's a team game, you know, Football's football is a
team game.
Speaker 4 (10:22):
It's the team that wins. It's the same as cooking.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
If one guy's let me down and he doesn't pass
the ball correctly, then we don't succeed. So it's very
much that team sport, you know, and having everyone around
you on the same trajectory as you are and the
same vision that you are, then you will succeed.
Speaker 2 (10:39):
And it'd be interesting to see their trajectories too. So
if you've just joined us, my guest tonight is a
Paul Froget who's just recently his restaurant's been awarded two
Mitchellin stars and I'm just talking a bit more about
his story, his background, how do you get to be
a top chieft like this? And I'll be back with
him in just a few minutes. This is real life
(10:59):
on news Talk ZEDB.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Intelligent interviews with interesting people. It's real life on Newstalk ZEDB.
Speaker 4 (11:10):
Stars.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
Welcome back to real life. I'm John Cown talking with
Paul Frogget, who's an internationally celebrated chef. What he is
now because he's got two Michellin stars and to be
able to put on his restaurant down in Queenstown. Essence,
and you've chosen some music for us. What have been
what have we been listening to? There?
Speaker 4 (11:43):
So that's the.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Sky through the Stars so I can spit it out.
Then it's the song very close to my heart and
then my family's high. It's the first concert that we
attended after my wife's breast cancer treatment in New Zealand,
so it's it's very close to our hearts as a
as a unit, as a family. And now those stars
have literally shined down on us and aligned for us
(12:09):
to have the two miss stars that we.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
That we picked up right now, that sounds like a
very significant chapter in your family's life. If your wife
went through brist cancer treatment, I hope it's been going
well and she's in a good remission.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
Yes, it's perfect. She's ten years remission. This year is
ten years. So it's very significant for us that these
stars have now come come and lined and dropped and
dropped for me, dropped for the restaurant, drop for us.
It is like I said earlier, it's a family. It's
a team effort. It's also a family effort.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
Right for everyone. Family did you start your family when
you're in Asia. Is that part of the move to
to that part of the world that coincided with an
expansion of your family status.
Speaker 3 (12:58):
It wasn't in the flip of the coin of moving
to Singapore, But yes, that's you know.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
I ended up.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
I flipped the coin. I moved to Singapore. I ended
up spending five and a half years in Singapore. I
met a young lady. She now is the mother of
my two children and my wife. And that was the
reason that Asia played such a significant role.
Speaker 4 (13:18):
You know.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
With me, right, I know she is somewhat passionate about
harnessing nutrition in the maintenance of her health and her
recovery from breast cancer. Has she taken you on that
journey as well? Is there something that you collaborate on
and the idea of food contributing to health.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
Yes, we went on a very big journey with it.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
We explored many options and tried the whole No sugar.
Speaker 4 (13:46):
I gave up sugar, not because of her, but with her.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
I gave up dairy in my home life, not because
of her, but with her. So yeah, it's changed me
and being open minded to these kind of options I
think is great you know, is.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Any of that translated into your menu choices.
Speaker 4 (14:09):
We don't cook with a lot of dairy. You know.
Speaker 3 (14:12):
There is some cream, and there is a little bit.
I do like butter, but it's not heavy, it's not rich.
I personally can't eat it if it's like that, So hand,
I don't want to.
Speaker 4 (14:21):
Cook by that.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Okay, you've got children. How many kids have you got? So?
Speaker 3 (14:27):
I have two children, sixteen and my daughter is thirteen.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
Right, I'm just sort of wondering. I know that being
a chef can be a very very high stress business.
And you talked before about the chef that you worked
with in the restaurant in France that obviously the stress
was too much for him. Family life is stressful. Having
a wife of cancer is stressful. How do you balance
(14:53):
all these things? I mean, your time zone that you
work in is so out of kilter with the time
zone that the family's work in. How do you balance
all this? You obviously do because you still thriving as
a family.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
Yes, to be honest with you, John, it's a lot
of hard work on all parts of the family. You know,
my wife often mentions to friends that she's the chef widow.
You know, she goes to parties and I'm cooking, or
she will go to things and I'm cooking. But it's
making the time and making sure that you're present, you know.
I have days off and I'm allocated to the family
(15:30):
time when I'm home. I'm home, I try not to work,
I try not to look at things. I do gravitate
to food. I am very interested in food. So a
lot of things are rather around food at.
Speaker 4 (15:43):
The dinner table.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
So we have a lot, we have a lot of
conversations at the dinner table. We sit down probably for
maybe two and a half hours for dinner when I'm
at home and we talk. That's that's our talking time.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
What time does your working day finish?
Speaker 4 (15:59):
About eleven pm?
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Eleven pm, so you're probably not probably an early rise
of then. It does put you out of sync with
your kids and family life.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
It does a little bit. I've I do. I've made
that I need to make the conscious effort to be up.
I'm up at about seven thirty, quarter to eight, just
so that i can get a little bit of time
with them before they go after school, you know, and
I'll drop them at school. I walk I walked to
the high school with my with my with my daughter
when she was at the school down the road. Just
(16:30):
to try nice, yeah, just to try and make that
that change and just make the connection with them rather
than our dad's sleeping or dos at work.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Right, And I was just wondering, what do you do
with the time that you're on your own? Then you've
got time off during the day. Do you do you
go fishing? Do you go walking? Do you just sit
down and experiment with cooking? How do you spend your
time during the day before you have to head off
to work.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
So there's a funny story there, John. I when we
moved to New Zealand, I didn't have any hobbies. I
was a man of very little time, of very little hobbies.
And it was my wife again, who's who suggested I
took up a hobby. And I did something a little
bit different. And I had a good friend of good
(17:16):
family friends who and I said to I need, I
need a hobby.
Speaker 4 (17:18):
What should I do?
Speaker 3 (17:19):
You know?
Speaker 4 (17:19):
I'm like, I'm like fly fishing or golf.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
And he said to me, take up fly fishing because
you're still fit and you can still get out there
and do it. So I immersed myself into fly fishing, and
I spent the past, you know what, probably eight years
putting as much effort into my cooking as I now
do into my fly fishing. So for me, fishing and
exploring and tramping is high on my agenda.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
I'm starting to understand now why your restaurants have been
in places like hook Are Lodge down here a good
trout stream and yes, and Queen's Stout and good trout fishing.
Speaker 4 (17:54):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Okay, Actually coming to New Zealand after having been in
these Micheland restaurants and France, England, Hong Kong, Singapore, surely
coming to New Zealand must have seemed like a culinary
backwater and a bit of career suicide. How is it
you decided, okay, let's go to a place with only
(18:15):
four million people and they like fish and chips, you know,
let's go. How did you decide to do that?
Speaker 3 (18:24):
We had a we had a family meeting again the
dinner table, and we decided that. You know, I met
the executive chef from Hooko Lodge in Hong Kong and
he told me that this New Zealand dream story. He
saw me this dream and I was like, wow, it
sounds amazing, and we had a family meeting and we
(18:46):
decided that maybe we needed to put it.
Speaker 4 (18:49):
I needed I needed to put a little.
Speaker 3 (18:51):
Bit more effort into raising children, and we wanted to
raise children in a in a in a safe and
beautiful place.
Speaker 4 (18:57):
We knew that much.
Speaker 3 (18:58):
We didn't know that we'd end up at hook Lodge,
New Zealand, but we knew that we had to change
a little bit. So that was the catalyst for it.
And then yeah, applying to Hooker getting the job at
hook Lodge. The first three years were really tough. The
first week was immensely tough, purely because I couldn't get
(19:20):
coffee after three o'clock. Everything closed on Sundays at lunchtime.
The supermarket closed at five o'clock and I used to
shop at eight o'clock. So it was a real big
culture shop, you know, coming out of Hong Kong into Talpo,
which is beautiful, but there's very little happening.
Speaker 4 (19:38):
It was quite closure shocks for all of us.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
The deceleration could have possibly been almost fatal. Though, fantastic
that you survived it, and think that you survived it
for about ten years.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
I'm so glad that you know, John, it was amazing, amazing,
It was purely amazing.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Right now, you've talked a bit about stars aligning and
flipping coins, and your life seems to have worked out well.
Have you had a sense that there has been a
sort of a hand on your shoulder they're coming through life.
Speaker 4 (20:07):
I the chas is yes.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
I lost my father when I was two and a
half years old, and I was always told by the
people around your family, friends that he was always watching
over me. And so I always had this belief that
there was someone on my shoulder or deep withinside of
me that I could if I really wanted to try
and do it, I'd be able to do it. It
(20:31):
was that belief that kind of got me through everything.
You know, thick thin, and we've had some we've had
some hard times as a family and as a person.
There's hard times to be had, but you know, with
the courage and that belief that you know, we can succeed.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Yeah, that's that's very interesting. Hey, just just just a
final thing. I'm a bit of a novice, a bit
of a newbie when it comes to find dining. And
you can look out in your restaurant, I'm sure you
can see the experienced guestro tourists who you know, who
know everything about what's on the menu and things, and
you probably see the people that have only ever designed,
(21:05):
only ever dined in a restaurant like yours a couple
of times. Is there any advice that you could give
to someone like myself who's a bit of a fine
dining newbie.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Just just enjoy it for the moment. You know, we're
very lucky. People come and they spend you know, two
hours with us, two and a half hours of us.
Just be really open to it and just really enjoy
what we're trying to do. You know, I want people
to I say, you're in our dining room, I'm cooking,
you're in my house.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
Just enjoy what we do and just be like, yeah,
this is this is what it is.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Okay. So it's an experience more than nutrition, it's entertainment
as well.
Speaker 4 (21:45):
It's a journey. It's a journey, John, it's a journey.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Well, thanks for sharing some of the journey that you've
been on, and I wish you all the best. I mean,
you're already celebrating your two stars. You can get another one,
can't you? Is there going to be the goal you
get it through you.
Speaker 4 (22:00):
Can get It's a dream. Let's put it that way.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Okay, Well you need you need your new dream. Now
I have to reach this stream. It's been great talking
with you. I've been speaking with Paul Frogget, who's a
two star Michellan Star winner down in uh down in
Queenstown and pets. Look forward to dining with you sometime.
Thank you for taking time to be on real life.
Thank you, this is real life. I'm John Cown. Looking
(22:24):
forward to being back with you again next Sunday night.
Speaker 5 (22:29):
M seer see Funny Sail seem.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
To come out
Speaker 1 (23:23):
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