Joel Bennetts

At the ripe age of 15, Joel started cooking, in the highly accoladed PIER Restaurant under Greg Doyle & Grant King in Sydney Australia, his first 3 & a half years were spent developing knowledge of the best quality seafood the country had to offer & how to prepare & serve with precision.

His next adventure was onto Bistrode CBD, under the Merivale umbrella, where he was taught an array of English & French techniques from the late Jeremy Strode. Joel’s relationship with both Grant & Jeremy went on to open 2 more venues with them Gastro Park & Fish Shop where he was able to further develop his skill & knowledge in the world of fine dining seafood venues.

With a change of lifestyle, Joel found himself at the Three Blue Ducks. A dynamic café and restaurant empire located minutes from the famous Bronte beach. Joel spent 3 years there again adding new knowledge & skills to his repertoire, working under Chefs Darren Robertson & Mark Labrooy.

From there, Joel ventured into his first head chef role, at the iconic 100-year-old venue Hotel Palisade, a 2-level rooftop bar called Henry Deane, where Joel was able to take what he had learned & build incredible menus from that.

Consulting was the next step, he spent 6 months living & working in Beijing & Shenzhen China, opening, restoring & developing concepts & menus for Chinese hospitality groups. An eye-opening experience that allowed him to work with incredible produce as well as spread his knowledge & skill on an international level.

The alps of Japan, Myoko Kogen is where Joel found his next venture, in a 10-room boutique hotel, where a 16-seat table was the center of attention, and an 8-course plant-based degustation was hand ushered from the kitchen 6 nights a week, a delicate yet complex menu was created from local ingredients within a 40km radius.

A vegan pasta bar by the name of Peppes, in his local town of Bondi, a 40-seater boasting some of the best vegan pasta in Sydney

Most recently Joel lead the kitchen teams at FISHSHOP & FSHMKT, Bondi’s newest seafood venue. Within a matter of weeks from the doors opening, FSHSHP had a cult following, with people flocking there for fresh seafood cooked with simplicity & elegance.