LOCATION: MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA / LONDON, U.K.

Mike Reid is Culinary Director of the Rare Restaurant Group in the UK and Consultant Chef to some of Australia’s finest restaurants. His family life is split between the UK and Australia with his wife and two young children living in Melbourne but many work commitments also in London.

Mike is also prominent on TV across both countries – in the UK he is a Judge alongside Michel Roux Jr on the new prime-time Channel 4 and Netflix series ‘Five Star Kitchen’. He appears regularly on Saturday Kitchen, Sunday Brunch and Steph’s Packed Lunch, and was in the chef line-up in Ready Steady Cook and ITV’s ‘Cooking with The Stars’.

Meanwhile, in Australia, Mike became a co-host of TEN’s Ten Minute Kitchen and My Market Kitchen, and filmed alongside Justine Schofield on Everyday Gourmet and Diana Chan on Asia Unplated. Mike’s passion for gastronomy began in his earliest years, but he didn’t commence his professional career until 2001 when he spent all of his free time learning the ropes at Truffles of Southsea brasserie whilst studying for his BA in Business & Marketing at the University of Portsmouth. Upon graduating, it was clearly apparent that his vocation lies in the culinary arts, so he headed for the bright lights of London, where his illustrious career as a chef took wing. It wasn’t long after he secured an apprenticeship at The In & Out club in St James that Mike began working in the kitchens of the Royal Air Force Club. 

Following this, he trained in two of London’s definitive fine dining restaurants, Le Gavroche and Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, where his skills were honed under the tutelage of celebrated chefs Michel Roux Jr and Mr Ramsay himself.

In April 2007, Mike’s career leapt forward as he joined the team at Gaucho restaurants as Head Chef and soon becoming Executive Chef position for the entire Gaucho Group. In 2013, Mike left London to rattle the pans in Australia’s thriving restaurant scene, spending six months undertaking stages at Melbourne’s most celebrated restaurants. These included working with world-class chef Ben Shewry in The World’s 50 Best Restaurant ‘Attica’. He then worked in Andrew McConnell’s 2 Hat restaurant Cutler and Co, which gave him a great insight into Modern Australian cuisine and its many Asian influences. Soon after, Mike started work with Shannon Bennett and cooked with some of Australia's finest chefs, including George Calombaris, Curtis Stone and Peter Gilmore. He cooked alongside Heston Blumenthal at The Skinny Duck charity event.

Mike continues to work in top restaurants and appear on TV screens on either side of the globe as he travels between the two.