Knutsford Gourmet

My name is Lisa Richards and I am the owner and chef at Knutsford Gourmet.

I trained as a chef here in Perth and at that time was very fortunate to work with some amazing chefs and mentors that definitely gave me the drive, encouragement and confidence to get to where I did in my career over the years.

At the age of 21 I packed my bags and moved to London for the experience of a life time and to start my career with Harvey Nicholas at the Oxo Tower. In that 4 years I worked hard to make my way up the ladder from Commis Chef to Chef Tournant until I was headhunted to join the team in Manchester’s new Harvey Nicholas Fine Dining Restaurant as Sous Chef.
Burning the candle at both ends with learning experiences, tasks of a new restaurant set up and moving from Brasserie to Fine Dining it was an amazing, over whelming and burning out learning experience of a life time, over 4 more years till enough was enough and I moved home to Perth.

Once home I took on the roll of Sr Sous Chef at Vans Café in Cottesloe, cooking some amazing Modern Australian and Asian inspired foods for 1 year, at which point I progressed to Head Chef.
Although short and sweet before I became a mum, my career as a head chef was a turning point for me believing that what I have achieved, done and seen over my years in a kitchen got me here and I can actually accomplish anything!
I stayed in the kitchen for as long as I could until my pregnant belly just got in the way.

Once I became a stay at home mum, fancy food and dedication in the kitchen really took a back seat to my everyday life and needs of our new family. Meal times became what was the easiest and quickest thing to get on the table, even if it meant serving the same meal every night or everyone’s favourite, left overs.

Living in North Perth I loved to visited our local Kyilla Farmers Market early on a Saturday morning to get that little touch of heaven again, fresh fruit and vegetables, bread baked that morning, fish as fresh as it gets, the smell of coffee in the morning and cheese, lets not forget about the cheese….
Buying my cheese on a regular basis from Le Grand Fromage, I asked him one day if he sold biscuits.
“No he said, but I was thinking of stocking them”
“I can make you biscuits if you like, I’ll bring you some samples”
On the eve of my first market in August 2014, I found myself at the kitchen table still packing biscuits and preparing for market at 1am.

Since then Knutsford Gourmet has grown from a small hobby to a business of pleasure, supplying biscuits, crackers and pastes to families, cheese lovers and amazing communities of people for everyday use, birthdays, gifts, hampers and all manners of celebration, that call for cheese.
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Lisa
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