5 Questions with Jess Ho
Jess Ho is best known for their take-no-prisoners opinions on the hospitality industry. They were the food and drink editor for Time Out Melbourne, having previously contributed to several bar and restaurant guides for the publication along with countless reviews.
Jess has also been published in The Guardian, Food service REP, Virgin Voyeur, Time and Tide and Eater and has contributed to many restaurant guides and cookbooks. Raised by Wolves is Jess’s first book.
No.1
We love to know how ideas for books germinate. How did Raised by Wolves come about?
It started with stubbornness if I am going to be completely honest. I didn’t want to write a memoir when I started and [instead] pitched a hospo survival guide. But it started to sound too self-helpy. That full circle of reluctance and acceptance was the light bulb moment in the writing process for Raised by Wolves. Everything else was just sifting through the trauma and telling stories that won’t incriminate anyone but me.
No.2
You’re known for your take-no-prisoners opinions on the hospitality industry, which is also present in your memoir. You also don’t deny your complicity in the bad dynamics the food industry perpetuates—‘popular food culture was fucked and I hated my life because I had made myself part of the problem’—particularly as we think through pervasive issues such as class and gender. Can you speak more to this?
It’s so heavy and layered. I grew up in a time where I was told to suppress my Asian-ness. The industry was also proudly patriarchal and brazenly misogynistic. I came up in a time where I had so much shame and internalised racism that I wasn’t even aware of. And that’s where the internet came in—I read criticisms of white-washed food publications and the culture it fed into and was introduced to commentary from BIPOC voices in food. It made me realise that I had been brainwashed to hate myself.
When you’re surrounded by people who have been indoctrinated into a toxic culture, it takes a lot to walk away from it and demand better. I’d like to hope that my career after that point has been about championing the right voices and shining a light on what isn’t acceptable behaviour anymore. Whether it is making a difference, well…
No.3
As former Time Out Melbourne food and drink editor, as well as host of the Bad Taste podcast and many more food-related projects, it’s evident that your expertise is in food. Can you run us a little bit through what your eating habits look like? What kind(s) of food do you cook for yourself at home? What are your favourite foods and what are some absolute no-nos? And, what is your favourite restaurant in Melbourne?
My day-to-day eating habits are pretty boring. I love food, but I also train seven days a week, so I eat a consistent diet and I try to not eat animal protein when I cook for myself at home. I also eat a lot, but that will be of no surprise to anyone. I make my own sourdough, so breakfast is always that, a handful of greens and eggs. When people think of meal prep, they think it’s dry chicken and sad vegetables, but I make herbal soups, stocks, a lot of rice, namul and pickled vegetables from the glut of produce in my garden. Lunches and dinners are always a combination of those elements with a protein. I always snack on seasonal fruit. I love cooking so if I have friends over, I’ll always put on a home-style Cantonese banquet with steamed eggs, fish, pork-stuffed peppers in black bean sauce, braised offal, or whatever is in season. It’s nostalgic for me, but everyone else thinks it is such a treat because you can’t order a lot of those dishes from restaurants.
Noodle soups are my favourite thing in the world, and I find it really hard to go longer than a few days without a bowl. I am also a sucker for fries. I’m the kind of person who will order a pub meal that comes with fries, and another serve of fries on top of that.
After all these years, I still can’t make friends with bitter melon. I’ll eat it if it is part of a meal, but I wouldn’t choose to order it. I don’t care if it is good for me.
As for my favourite restaurant, it’s a tough one. I love small businesses that are cuisine-driven so Tom Toon, Chopstick Delight, Mumchan, Mr Lee’s, Mankoushe, Karlaylisi, Ras Dashen and countless others are always high recommendations for me.
Oh, and one of them is the restaurant in the epilogue of the book.
No.4
You’ve probably been asked this many times, but for the sake of Liminal readers who may be new to your work, what does your ideal hospo scene look like? What needs to be changed currently?
This is a huge question. I think the reason why the [hospo] industry has gone unchecked for so long is that it is a trade that has been romanticised by media and the upper-class as a gateway to a particular lifestyle, so it isn’t properly regulated. It’s a rough business and I don’t think that people who have never been in hospitality before understand it is hard work with very little return. You can’t just buy a café as a hobby.
There should be a course you undertake to protect you from throwing your life savings away, but also prepare you for how brutal the industry is—kind of like getting a driver’s license. On top of that, I think the industry should unionise. Sexual harassment, racism, health risks and wage theft are rife, and staff are too exhausted to understand their rights, and they’re not even educated on who to talk to when it is clear that they’re being taken advantage of and thrown away like a used tissue when they’re burnt out. Mental health is also greatly overlooked, and any form of assistance is near impossible to engage. The cost is also prohibitive to those earning minimum wage.
I also think that the entire ecosystem around food, including trade, wine, media, and public relations needs to be better educated and have more diversity because they’re complicit in the unsustainable and culturally tone-deaf way that diners interact with bars and restaurants.
No.5
Who are the food writers who remain an inspiration to you?
I think it is hard to point to a single writer who inspires me, as I think there is a new movement of food writers who are taking control of the conversation. These days, I am much more interested in exchanges around politics, culture, geography, and history because it brings a human element to the discussion of cuisine and prevents food from being diminished to entertainment. A particular platform that is doing it well is a Substack called Vittles, which is championing a different style of storytelling around food, from a range of voices that may be viewed as too ‘radical’ for traditional media.
(Credit: Farley Webb)
Jess Ho is one of the most influential voices in Australia’s bar and restaurant scene, well known for their searingly honest opinions on the hospitality industry.
Growing up confronting racism in the outer suburbs of Melbourne, Ho’s family’s traditional Cantonese cooking was both a comfort and a source of shame. As the Australian restaurant scene boomed, they embarked on a career in food writing at a time when the once ‘embarrassing’ foods of immigrant childhoods were quickly becoming commodified trends.
In their new memoir, Raised by Wolves, Ho weaves a coming-of-age story into an exploration of the industry they love, revealing the truths – both ugly and inspiring – behind Australia’s fine-dining obsession.
Get it from Affirm Press here, or at all good bookstores.