Jo Ward is well into the third decade of her career: she’s worked with chefs like , and – luminaries who helped form the fabric and framework for the high-calibre, diverse and nuanced restaurant industry we have today. Born and raised in the wine region of Rutherglen in rural Victoria, what started as an after-school job as a kitchen hand became a fully-fledged career, which she temporarily put on hold because of her sister Robyn's health.
“My younger sister got sick with cancer and I was her main carer. I spent a lot of year 11 in the hospital with her and after she passed, I didn’t feel I wanted to go back. I was 16. I was offered an apprenticeship and that’s how it all began. I worked for four years [at Chatlers], day and night, I had no life. And the day it was over, I packed my car and drove to Melbourne.”
Having been schooled by a Swiss-German chef who was a stickler for the fundamentals of cooking, Ward took a job at the Regent hotel with Dietmar Sawyere (who was ). She went from collaborating with one chef to suddenly dealing with 60 chefs. It was a huge learning curve – and an experience Ward took on with gusto. After a two and half years, she moved to Adelaide and ended up working with chef and culinary icon, Cheong Liew. The next decade of Ward’s life was spent learning alongside Liew, the chef credited with introducing many South East Asian flavours and
If you ask many food historians about Australia’s golden age of food, chances are you'll hear that it happened in Adelaide from the late '70s and into the early '90s and Ward was poised to be a part of that evolution. “I think the best thing I learned from Cheong, I only realised after I stopped working for him. He said, ‘You must have conviction.’ In his eyes, if you were going to do something, there had to be a purpose behind it and you must believe in it. For me, that sentiment has stuck and it’s something I pass onto everyone who has worked for me since then.”
Flash forward another decade and a half and Ward has been involved in the opening of short-lived but much loved , opened as a co-owner, worked with chef Chui Lee Luk at true Sydney institution , and even managed to cook in Greece with Michelle Powell, her then-yet-to-be business partner in .
Given that Bistro Rex is the third French restaurant Ward has been involved in, the chef has interestingly enough, never been to France. Rather, she identifies with the way French cuisine honours technique, the quality of good ingredients, and at the heart of things, a philosophy that food should be simple and soulful.
Given that Bistro Rex is the third French restaurant Ward has been involved in, the chef has interestingly enough, never been to France.
In her 33 years as a heads-down, silent assassin of a chef, Ward seems unphased by the lack of hype that's greeted her high-grade skill, knowledge, charm and wit. “At the end of the day, you have to really love it, hospitality. Feeding people good food and seeing their response, the people I meet, the friendships you make and the people you teach – that’s why I do this.”
So when does she hope to take that long-awaited trip to France? “Next year. I just want to go and soak it all in. Seeing the everyday life and what it means to be in that place, the very Frenchness of it all, that’s what I’m most looking forward to.”
Love the story? Follow the author here: Twitter , Facebook and Instagram .
Have we got your attention and your tastebuds? airs every weeknight at 6pm on SBS followed by an encore screening at 9.30pm on SBS Food Network. Episodes will be available after broadcast via . Join the conversation #TheChefsLine on Instagram , Facebook and Twitter . Check out for episode guides, cuisine lowdowns, recipes and more!
