#176 Brad Cunningham | Waygood

I was excited to speak to Brad Cunningham at Waygood for a number of reasons. He is an ex-pat chef from Aotearoa New Zealand and he has worked in numerous places around the world, including my home town of Otautahi, Christchurch, as well as in Paris and London. I particularly loved that in his LinkedIn profile, Brad says he has lived and worked in some of the world’s greatest cities and he lists those as London, Paris, Sydney, Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Melbourne. Anyone who includes Christchurch on such an erudite list is an excellent person as far as I am concerned. I was also captivated by the idea that Brad worked as head chef at Ottolenghi in London and I am such a fan of Yotham Ottolenghi and of course, I wanted to hear all about that. That does make it sound as though I was on my own wish fulfilment path heading into this conversation and I have to say, Brad absolutely indulged my need to hear how great Christchurch is and some lovely inside information about Yotham, but I came away feeling lucky to have spoken to Brad. He is quietly spoken and articulately describes his food, the ups and downs of life as a chef and the fact that he has come full circle in aiming for and achieving an Executive chef role but realising he is happiest being on the pans in a small neighbourhood restaurant and giving diners a good time. I appreciated his sincerity and humility. This is a chef who has worked in top kitchens but doesn’t court fame and a lot of attention. For Brad it all comes back to his passion for food and putting beautiful ingredients on the plate and I loved that.