Dirty Chef ― From Big City Food Critic to Foodie Farmer

The funny, heart-warming and at times exhausting behind-the-scenes story of Matthew Evans' transformation from high-profile food critic to television's Gourmet Farmer

From an often controversial job as one of Australia's most powerful food critics, Matthew Evans stepped, unknowing and untested, off the treadmill. Leaving the urban grit of a terrace house in Sydney's inner west, he ended up on 20 acres in Australia's most southernmost shire; a smallholder farmer in Tasmania with no clue. What is it really like to take the plunge and leave a whole world of familiar people, places, and work behind? How does it feel to have never used a cordless drill, to suddenly plant a garden, to milk a cow, to build sheds and shelters? And what if a TV show is filming the transformation at the same time? This is the story of that transformation. The story of a life more in tune with the seasons and more connected to the soil. A life that is as rewarding as it is exhausting. The story of a family trying to turn a living from the ancient, noble art of growing things on the land.

Matthew Evans is a former chef and food critic turned Tasmanian smallholder. He fattens pigs, milks a cow, tends a garden, and writes about food from his office overlooking the silver birches atop his cottage on Puggle Farm, in the gorgeous Huon Valley. Matthew is the author of eight books on food, including the authoritative Real Food Companion. He writes regularly for Feast magazine, presents a television show, Gourmet Farmer, and runs a small artisan food store in Hobart with a cheesemaker mate, Nick Haddow. The shop specializes in old and rare breed pork products from Matthew's Fat Pig Farm, among other goodies.