π¦πΊ Australia Β· Australian cuisine Β· b. 1977
New Zealand-born chef-owner of Attica in Melbourne; defining figure in modern Australian cuisine.
Ben Shewry is a New Zealand-born Australian chef, born in 1977 in rural Taranaki on New Zealand's North Island. He grew up on a remote sheep and beef farm and has spoken extensively about an outdoor childhood β foraging, fishing, hunting eels β that became the foundation of his later cooking. He began working in restaurant kitchens at the age of ten and trained through his teens at restaurants around Taranaki and in Wellington and Christchurch before moving to Melbourne in 2002.
He joined Attica as head chef in 2005, when the small restaurant in the unfashionable bayside suburb of Ripponlea was struggling. Over the following five years he transformed it: a complete rewriting of the menu around native Australian ingredients β finger limes, wattleseed, lemon myrtle, saltbush, native pepperberry, kangaroo, marron β and a tasting-menu format built on long, dialogue-driven service. Attica entered The World's 50 Best Restaurants for the first time in 2010 and has been on the list continuously ever since, peaking at #20 in 2017.
He purchased Attica from its previous owners in 2016 and has run it as chef-owner since. He has been deeply engaged with Indigenous Australian foodways, working in long-running collaborations with Aboriginal communities β in particular with members of the YolΕu of Arnhem Land β both to source native ingredients on terms set by the communities themselves and to be public about which traditions Attica is and is not entitled to draw on. He has spoken openly that this collaboration is the centre of Attica's project, not an aesthetic add-on.
Shewry was featured in Season 1 of Netflix's Chef's Table (2015), in an episode that did more than any other single piece of media to introduce modern Australian cuisine to a global audience. His memoir Use It All (2022) won multiple Australian book awards and is widely cited in the Australian restaurant industry as an unusually candid account of the personal and economic costs of running a fine-dining restaurant.
A restaurant in Australia should be of Australia β not a French or Italian or Japanese restaurant relocated to Melbourne. Shewry has argued for two decades that Australian fine dining failed for most of its history by importing European templates onto Australian ingredients; his project at Attica has been to build a tasting-menu format from the native pantry outward, with Indigenous Australian collaborators as essential partners.
Shewry's flagship and only restaurant. Tasting-menu native-Australian cuisine; on The World's 50 Best Restaurants list continuously since 2010.
These recipes from our database reflect the australian cooking tradition that Ben works in. They are not direct reproductions of Ben's copyrighted recipes, but traditional dishes inspired by the same culinary heritage.
βAn Australian restaurant should be Australian. We spent fifty years pretending otherwise. The result was not very good.β
β Chef's Table, Netflix (2015)
βIf we want to cook with native Australian ingredients, we have to listen to the people whose ingredients they are.β
β Use It All (2022)
Begins working in restaurant kitchens at age ten in rural Taranaki, New Zealand.
Moves from New Zealand to Melbourne, Australia.
Joins Attica in Ripponlea, Melbourne, as head chef.
Attica enters The World's 50 Best Restaurants for the first time.
Publishes Origin: The Food of Ben Shewry.
Featured in Season 1, Episode 4 of Netflix's Chef's Table.
Purchases Attica from its previous owners; becomes chef-owner.
Attica reaches #20 on The World's 50 Best Restaurants β its highest ever ranking.
Wins the Chef's Choice Award at The World's 50 Best Restaurants.
Publishes Use It All, his memoir.
Ben Shewry is a New Zealand-born Australian chef and the chef-owner of Attica in Melbourne. Attica has been on The World's 50 Best Restaurants list continuously since 2010 and is widely considered the most important restaurant in modern Australian cuisine.
Attica is a tasting-menu restaurant in the unfashionable bayside Melbourne suburb of Ripponlea, built around native Australian ingredients β finger limes, wattleseed, lemon myrtle, saltbush, native pepperberry, marron, kangaroo β and long-running collaborations with Indigenous Australian communities. Its signature includes a course of potato cooked in earth that has been on the menu in varying forms for more than a decade.
Yes. A central part of Shewry's project at Attica is long-running collaboration with Aboriginal communities β in particular with members of the YolΕu of Arnhem Land β to source native ingredients on the communities' own terms, and to be public about which traditions Attica is and is not entitled to draw on. He has spoken openly that this collaboration is not an aesthetic add-on but the centre of the restaurant's identity.
Shewry was born in 1977 in rural Taranaki on the North Island of New Zealand and grew up on a remote sheep and beef farm. He has spoken extensively about an outdoor childhood β foraging, fishing, hunting eels β as the foundation of his later cooking. He moved to Melbourne in 2002.
No. Shewry began working in restaurant kitchens at the age of ten in rural Taranaki and trained on the job through his teens in New Zealand restaurants, then in Melbourne kitchens after 2002. He has no formal culinary-school education.
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