Legendary Australian Chef Kylie Kwong Talks Elder Wisdom, Indigenous Ingredients, and the Energy of Grief

On this episode

When chef Kylie Kwong announced that she was going to be shuttering her destination dining spot Lucky Kwong to take on a new role at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, working at the intersection of food, community, and education to honor the people and foods that have made Australian cuisine so distinctive and precious — it made sense. Kwong has always centered humanity in everything she does, including this raw and astonishing conversation about cooking for a first date, valuing the wisdom of elders, finding your way through grief, and so much more.

Meet our guest

After three decades as a chef, author, TV presenter, and cultural ambassador, Kylie Kwong joined the Powerhouse Associate Program at Sydney, Australia's Powerhouse Museum. Her work there entails three projects including the exploration of the Chinese communities of Western Sydney, a celebration of the culinary traditions in Harris Park's Indian community, and food education for school children. Kwong's innovative Cantonese Australian cuisine at her restaurants Billy Kwong and Lucky Kwong earned her an international fanbase, and she is widely regarded as a driving force in the movement to use and respect indigenous Australian ingredients like Warrigal greens, saltbush, and Davidson plums. Her first series, Kylie Kwong: Heart and Soul, premiered in 2003 alongside a book of the same name, and Kwong has since become a fixture on Australian television as well as a celebrated cookbook author.

Meet our host

Kat Kinsman is the executive features editor at Food & Wine, author of Hi, Anxiety: Life With a Bad Case of Nerves, host of Food & Wine's podcast, and founder of Chefs With Issues. Previously, she was the senior food & drinks editor at Extra Crispy, editor-in-chief and editor at large at Tasting Table, and the founding editor of CNN Eatocracy. She won a 2024 IACP Award for Narrative Food Writing With Recipes and a 2020 IACP Award for Personal Essay/Memoir, and has had work included in the 2020 and 2016 editions of The Best American Food Writing. She was nominated for a James Beard Broadcast Award in 2013, won a 2011 EPPY Award for Best Food Website with 1 million unique monthly visitors, and was a finalist in 2012 and 2013. She is a sought-after international keynote speaker and moderator on food culture and mental health in the hospitality industry, and is the former vice chair of the James Beard Journalism Committee.

Highlights from the episode

On taking a leap of faith

"About a year and a half ago I was saying to some of my friends, 'You know, I'm going to be 55 soon,' and that is by no means old, but it was an awareness that I had been in this same industry for all of those years and perhaps had a desire to do something different. But there was also an anxiety. I said to them, 'I don't know what to do. I only know how to be a chef and a restaurateur.' And they said, 'Don't be so ridiculous. You have this lifetime's worth of experience. You have so many connections to community and all of your different passions. You could be a consultant, you could freelance.' That planted a seed and gave me a little bit of confidence."

On a lightbulb moment

"When René Redzepi first came to Australia in 2010, he gave a keynote address at the Sydney Opera House as part of the Sydney International Food Festival. All of the food industry went because we were very interested in this young Danish guy. What was he all about? He said, 'Hi, everyone. I've been in Sydney for a week. Where's the kangaroo? Where's the emu? Where's the Warrigal greens? Where is the saltbush? I don't see any of this on your menu.' Then he started speaking about the importance of chefs or cooks using native produce to express a certain time, place, history, culture, flavor, memory, tradition, of the country they are in. That was just this incredible lightbulb moment for me. I sat up in my chair and I thought to myself, 'Kylie. Why haven't you been using native ingredients?' The next day, I made some phone calls."

On culinary diplomacy

"Discovering Australian native ingredients and integrating those ingredients into my Cantonese-style food really gave me an opportunity to create an authentic and meaningful version of traditional Australian Chinese food. That's what I've been offering ever since 2010. It not only worked from a delicious point of view; there seems to be a natural simpatico between the wonderful, singular, unique, distinct flavors of Australian native ingredients with the savory profile of Cantonese ingredients. It also marked the beginning of a realization of how influential chefs and restaurateurs can be in terms of cultural advocacy, social advocacy, and political advocacy. It was my way of supporting, respecting, and acknowledging the first Australians. Without being overtly political, my staff and I are now serving you the saltbush cakes or the steamed dumplings with Warrigal greens. And then the customer says, 'These taste beautiful. What is that green leaf?' And then we start the conversation."

On staying out of the kitchen — or not

"I remember the first week I arrived at the museum, I was texting my wife, Nell, and I said, 'This just feels so weird.' Every single thing about this new chapter is completely different. Even the way I was using my body. I was sitting at my desk and doing a lot of typing, which was just so unusual. I mean, I'm a chef, I'm usually cutting and what have you. There's a staff kitchen which actually overlooks the office, so it's all still open. I said, 'I'm going to sit at the kitchen cause I just feel so at home.' And she's like, 'You're so funny. You've always gotta be near the fridge.'"

On the energy of grief

"Grief is, at the end of the day, energy. And what I've learned is that we have a channel through which to express the energy. We get into trouble when we don't express grief energy. It gets buried down below, it doesn't go anywhere. It just festers and turns into monsters, and comes out when you least expect it. It comes out in very distorted ways in one's daily life."

On Lucky

"I always just thought I would have children cause that's what we did in our family and we were very good at it. We know how to be mothers. Nell always wanted to have a family as well. Fortunately and much to our great happiness, Nell fell pregnant in 2012, but then very, very sadly and tragically, Lucky came way too early and we had a stillborn son. From 2012 to about 2017, it was a fog, a haze. And I remember when this dreadful tragedy happened, we both said to the grief counselor at the hospital, 'How long does this dreadful feeling stay with us?' And she said, 'It usually takes a few years for that intensity to kind of lessen.' And then she said, 'Maybe after five years you will start to feel some kind of level of normality.' That seemed like an eternity. But if you fast-forward to 10 years after Lucky was born, that's when I opened Lucky Kwong. It was a very special restaurant in honor of my lost child. When I think about the journey that Nell I went on to get to that point, where she was comfortable with me naming the restaurant that and she actually felt happy about it, and I was happy about it — I felt very proud of us. We made it through and we are still very close, if not closer. And one of the things that I will always love her so deeply for is that even through that darkest hour when Lucky came into the world, she said to me, 'We must never lose the love that made Lucky.'"

About the podcast

Food & Wine has led the conversation around food, drinks, and hospitality in America and around the world since 1978. Tinfoil Swans continues that legacy with a new series of intimate, informative, surprising, and uplifting interviews with the biggest names in the culinary industry, sharing never-before-heard stories about the successes, struggles, and fork-in-the-road moments that made these personalities who they are today.

This season, you'll hear from icons and innovators like Daniel Boulud, Rodney Scott, Asma Khan, Emeril and E.J. Lagasse, Claudia Fleming, Dave Beran and Will Poulter, Dan Giusti, Priya Krishna, Lee Anne Wong, Cody Rigsby, Kevin Gillespie, Pete Wells, David Chang, Raphael Brion, Christine D'Ercole, Channing Frye, Nick Cho, Ti Martin, Kylie Kwong, Yotam Ottolenghi, Dolly Parton and Rachel Parton George, Pati Jinich, Darron Cardosa, Bobby Flay, and other special guests going deep with host Kat Kinsman on their formative experiences; the dishes and meals that made them; their joys, doubts and dreams; and what's on the menu in the future. Tune in for a feast that'll feed your brain and soul — and plenty of wisdom and quotable morsels to savor.

New episodes drop every Tuesday. Listen and follow on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen.

These interview excerpts have been edited for clarity.

Editor’s Note: The transcript for download does not go through our standard editorial process and may contain inaccuracies and grammatical errors.