|
BEPPI POLESE - 1993
Beppi Polese began working when he left home at 14 to working in Milan as a dishwasher for Albergo Dorria in 1940. Slowly working his way up the restaurant hierarchy at the Albergo Duomo, Pricipe di Piedmonte and Paggagallo in Milan and subsequently to other numerous hotel dining rooms including Baglioni in Florence and the Ambassador in Rome.
His work in restaurants was interrupted for a year spent in a German concentration camp in Austria near the end of WW11 from which he managed to escape and find his way back to Italy where he fought for Partisans in northern Italy until the finish of the war.
In 1952 Beppi came to Australia. He worked for Romano’s, Milano’s and Prince’s restaurant all in Sydney before opening Beppi’s restaurant on 10 June 1956.
Beppi is considered the patriarch of Italian restaurants in Sydney and Beppi’s Restaurant is an institution. Over the years Beppi’s Restaurant has been the spawning ground for over 12 restaurateurs and restaurants in Sydney.
Beppi has been responsible for the coaxing of the Australian palate out of its Anglo-Saxon shell and introducing it to the flavours of his native Italy. Many Sydney siders consumed for the first time such modern mainstays of today’s restaurants as mussel, octopus and artichoke (the mussels he harvested himself in a small rubber boat scraping them off the pylons of the old wooden Spit Bridge as he was unable to buy them). Three generations of Sydney siders have passed through the doors of Beppi’s located in the same place as the first day it opened.
Over the years the restaurant and Beppi have accumulated over 28 awards for food and service including the inaugural Sydney Morning Herald Lanson Award for Professional Excellence.
Beppi’s is a Sydney institution and the man himself a legend of the restaurant industry in Sydney. He has been a major contributor to the lifestyle that makes Sydney such a sophisticated, vibrant cosmopolitan city.
Beppi’s passion for his profession and incredible drive and determination have acted as an inspiration for the many employees that have passed under his wing.
|
