For several decades Matt Preston has been on a mission to find the best of Australian food. As a reviewer, he taste-tested the work of chefs around the country and then, with MasterChef, he helped discover some of Australia’s most talented home cooks.
Since then, Matt’s made a career of tracking down flavours that even the most committed foodies wouldn’t have heard of – and the people creating them.
And he’s not even close to finished.
“For me, the best food stories don’t begin in a restaurant. They begin in a paddock, on a fishing boat, in a vineyard or with someone who’s spent a lifetime perfecting their craft,” Matt tells TV WEEK.
“So, to travel around Australia looking for those kind of people and discovering the stories behind them… that doesn’t feel like a job for me!”
With Plating Locally, Matt’s mission is to uncover the food suppliers and cooks we probably don’t know… but really should!
In the opening episode, Matt, 65, heads to Margaret River, south of Perth, to meet abalone farmer Brad Adams, who has turned a threatened eco-system around to supply restaurants (and anyone who drops by) with one of the most costly seafoods there is.
It’s a classic example of Matt exposing the incredibly complicated and almost insurmountable problems our primary producers have to push past to put the food on our plates.
“Sometimes the magnitude of what these people are doing simply escapes them – because they’re so busy doing it!” Matt says.
“I think that really interesting moment comes when you see them pause and think about what it is they’re actually achieving… Then they can swell with pride,” he continued.
“I think truly good TV is always about the people in the stories. Whether that’s in the MasterChef kitchen or on this new show.”
You can watch Matt Preston’s Plating Locally on Wednesday 8:30pm on SBS Food, or on SBS On Demand.
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