Australian Chef Tim Hollands graces Enderun Colleges

Highly regarded Australian chef, Tim Hollands conducted a demonstration for a seminar on Australian Dairy Ingredients in Food Service at Enderun Colleges’ Culinary Amphitheater on October 5, Wednesday.

Dairy Australia and the Australian Trade and Investment Commission (Austrade) brought the seminar to Enderun. Stewart Davey, Manager for International Market Access of Dairy Australia, discussed the ins and outs of the Australian dairy industry—from safety and quality regulations, to the value of exporting dairy to other countries. Davey mentioned that their dairy industry relies on exporting, with over 30% of their produce going to other countries.

He touched on the importance of the Southeast Asian market to the Australian dairy industry. “One in every three kilograms of dairy that we export goes to Southeast Asia”, he explained. In fact, many Australian dairy products are readily available in the Philippine market.

A short video presentation of Australia’s dairy production was shown to over 50 Enderun students. It went into some detail about the regulations specific to the dairy industry. After the video, the cooking demonstration followed.

Prior to his demonstration, Chef Hollands expressed his admiration for the Philippines, especially for its people. He associates Filipinos to the genesis of his passion for cooking, “I had a Filipino yaya,” he shared, and talked about how it was she that inspired him to start cooking.

Chef Hollands, with the help of Davey and Jessica Beard, a Trade Specialist from the Victorian government, made burrata with strawberry and basil salsa; haloumi, watermelon and mango stacks, and strawberry stuffed French toast, which was topped with butterscotch made from cream, butter, and brown sugar.

“Butter is the business,” he said with a laugh, going on to explain that butter tends to raise the food profile. Hollands furthered the discussion of butter while demonstrating the creation of compound butter, a mixture of butter and any ingredient desired. For his demo, he mixed unsalted butter with some chili, and herbs.

He later used this compound butter for searing a steak that went through sous vide at 52 degrees Celsius. “I think that’s the perfect temperature for steak,” he explained, giving the students lots of tips as he went along. He also recommended adding butter to the steak while sous vide cooking because this would help enhance the flavor of the meat.

During the demonstration, Hollands showed the students the simplicity of cooking with dairy products. He emphasized on the importance of complementing and contrasting food to preparing a menu. Otherwise, “No big skill needed, just shopping correctly,” he said, adding that having fresh ingredients is just as important as knowing how to cook.