Pioneer, innovator and veteran chef – Serge Dansereau is one of our best. A French Canadian by birth, Dansereau started work in Sydney at The Regent in 1983. He spent 18 years at the hotel, shooting their flagship restaurant to three-hat fame. Coupled with a forward thinking general manager, he was able to explore overseas trends and restaurants, bringing back to Australia a zest for interesting produce and small producers. At a time when you were lucky to get your hands on three different lettuce varieties, let alone a wild mushroom, Dansereau encouraged a greater knowledge of what we can produce in Australia and worked hard to get it from paddock to plate.
In 1998 Dansereau was approached to head up the kitchen in the iconic Bathers’ Pavilion on Balmoral Beach. A local himself, the offer proved too much to resist. The relative down-sizing was not as dramatic as it may have been, with Bathers’ still running three kitchens, two bars and 45 chefs. The Bathers’ Pavilion is about the locals, the ocean and the food – bringing his customers the best of Australia from the outside in. His latest challenge has been that of his children’s palates - a vegetable garden is his proposed solution, an extension of the paddock to plate concept, with mud patties and worms to keep the kids enthralled!
