Round Trip

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CHEF RYAN COLE likes things how he likes them. There’s a way of doing things. Whether it’s cutting an onion, packing the fridge, even washing the plates his food is served on – it’s all become part of a shorthand he’s spent the past three-and-a-half years refining as head chef of the number one restaurant in Africa*, spoken in a dialect wholly unique to his brigade at The Test Kitchen.

“The challenges of setting up a new kitchen team are immeasurable,” he says during a short break on the day before the official media launch of Salsify at the Roundhouse – his first restaurant – headed up in business partnership with Luke Dale Roberts and Luke’s wife Sandalene. “I’m OCD to the moon and all the way back. At The Test Kitchen, I could say, ‘Make me this, do that for me,’ and there were 15 people who could do exactly what I wanted because they’d had three years of training with me. Now I’ve got eight new guys in a kitchen that’s open for lunch and dinner. There was no masterclass where I went ‘This is how we do things’. I have to show each person, this is what I want from you. Eight times over. It’s hectic pressure, but I mean, that’s what keeps you alive.”