“As a young chef in the industry, I am continuously learning and evolving. I have had the privilege of working with some talented New Zealand chefs who have instilled in me a deep appreciation for the exceptional quality of meat and produce available in our country. I aspire to utilize this knowledge to educate others about the farm-to-table journey, using the plate as a blank canvas to showcase the flavour and origins of our ingredients.”

Max is a young chef trained and associated with Le Cordon Bleu New Zealand in Wellington. He says as a young chef he is always growing and learning in the industry about the quality of beef and lamb and how good it is.

Max used three different cuts in his lamb dish from the saddle, the shoulder through to some offal to showcase something a bit different to the more traditional cuts and also to showcase different ways to cook lamb in one dish. The lamb saddle was filled with a rocket and mint pesto which he then slowly rendered the skin and cooked the meat to a tender pink. For his secondary cut he used lamb shoulder braised and shredded, then bread crumbed and fried to give a textural element and added a lamb sweetbread pie to showcase using offal. He paired the lamb with a mint and pea puree and mint infused jus.

For his beef dish he used the best prime restaurant cut of fillet to showcase the finesse of the New Zealand aged beef with slowly braised oxtail in a cannelloni, paired with a tangy horseradish aubergine puree, sweet tender baby carrots, pickled baby onion and a hearty jus to seal the dish together. Max says this dish showcases the use of the best prime cut, and sometimes forgotten cheap secondary oxtail cut which can be used on the same plate to balance each other.