A dinner of Angus Reserve with Fast Ed
There were plenty of delights over the course of four days at Roundup, and at the top of the list was one of the culinary kind with celebrity chef and Angus Reserve brand ambassador ‘Fast Ed’ Halmagyi hosting a cooking demonstration for the crowd.
With NH Foods Australia the major sponsor for the 2022 event, their Verified Black Angus beef brand Angus Reserve was front and centre during the demonstration, which saw Fast Ed cook up a feast of mouth-watering Slow Cooked Angus Reserve Chuck Nachos with Hide-And-Seek Vegetables.
The demonstration had linkage to messages shared with attendees in other sessions with various relevant experts throughout Roundup regarding meat science and supply chain distribution
“First and foremost, I hope to inspire some of these incredible young people to think about not only what the breeding, rearing, showing, judging and management of cattle is all about, as that is really important, particularly if you are going into the farming world,” said Fast Ed. “But that you always need to remember that end user is not the farmer or the chef, the end user is the consumer.”
“And so, it’s a matter of keeping in mind what you are doing and why you are doing it and talking to them about how their work on farm translates to happy customers.”
During the demonstration Fast Ed highlighted meat cuts, where they come from and how to ultimately use the whole carcase whilst cooking and limiting wastage in the kitchen.
“It is my aim to share some knowledge about primary and secondary cuts of meat and how it makes such a fundamental difference to what we do, why you would grill some and slow cook others and talking about things like how muscle fibres work. And finally, I guess to show them a delicious dish for dinner.”
Not only were they treated to a tasty dinner thanks to Fast Ed, but the participants were also given some insight into his life and career, and how he came to be in the position he is today.
Starting out in kitchens as a teen after struggling to find his niche in the classroom, Fast Ed looked back at his beginnings and shared about his come up.
“When I was fourteen my father told me do you have a bike? I said yes and he said go for a ride and don’t come back until you have a job. So, I did and worked as a kitchen hand and after a couple of months I started to be a chef’s assistant and started to cook, and I fell in love with this thing,” he said.
“I ended up doing quite well in school and studied a law degree in Sydney, which I really hated. I loved the intellectual side of it, but I didn’t want to spend my life in a law office surrounded by lawyers when I loved being in a kitchen surrounded by chefs. So, I threw in the towel there so to speak and picked up a tea towel.”
When the floor was opened to questions from the Roundup participants, one question to Fast Ed, ‘what set you apart from the other chefs?’, brought out some sage advice for listening ears.
“People said to me, are you just in the right place at the right time? Maybe a bit, but I reckon that is missing the most important part of finding any kind of success in life. It’s right place, right time, right attitude. Each and every one of you has opportunities put in front of you each and every day and the question is, are you able to see it? Do you recognise it, or does it pass you by? If you see it, are you ready to do something about it?”
“If you do something about it, are you prepared to do the hard bits as well as the easy bits? In the end getting ahead in life is not about what you’re prepared to do but it’s about what you’re prepared to give up, because you’ve usually got plenty of choices but what are you prepared to really work hard for?”
“When I started working on television, for the first two years I earned zero dollars. I did it for free. In fact, the first year I paid for the ingredients,” he continued.
“I didn’t want to be on television and had no interest in it at all. But I knew that it might open some doors for me. I didn’t think it would last, but I was prepared to back myself. I had been able to see that it was an opportunity worth pursuing and I had to be prepared to go after it eventually.”
“The trick is not to make yourself the highest paid person in the room. The trick is to make yourself the most indispensable person in the room. Make sure people really need to have you around and you’re never out of a job.”
“All of you coming here for this event, each and every one of you are going to not only learn things, but you’re going to meet people. Those relationships could be the difference between your future success or even more success. And that’s why you’ve got to really latch on to what you can learn and make something of it. I wholeheartedly believe in this.”
Images: Showcase By Branded Ag
