Clarissa Feildel was at a nightclub in Sydney in 2011, when a friend of hers approached a handsome man and said: “I think my friend is a better cook than you.”
It might seem like a strange opening line, but that man was French chef, restauranteur and TV presenter Manu Feildel.
Clarissa (who was then Clarissa Weerasena) was working for WA jewellery brand Linneys, and her reputation in the kitchen was legendary among her social circle. But while her friend had obviously clocked the famous chef, Clarissa was unaware the stranger was famous for his culinary skills.
“I didn’t know who he was, so I didn’t think he could cook,” she says. “I didn’t know he was a chef when I met him. I just thought I could cook, and he couldn’t.”
The pair soon discovered they had a lot in common, and eventually Clarissa discovered that she wasn’t the only talented person in the kitchen. The pair married in 2018 and Manu and his chef friends were so impressed with Clarissa’s culinary skills, they encouraged her to pursue a career in food.
“A lot of the time when we do have people over, it is his friends who are chefs, and people in the industry, and it’s always me cooking and I get a lot of encouragement from them as well that I should do something with my so-called ‘home cooking’ skills,” she says.
Which is how Clarissa Feildel ended up hosting a cooking segment on lifestyle show Better Homes And Gardens. The latest season of the show, Feildel’s third, hits screens on Friday. Feildel will be sharing more of her home cooking which is largely influenced by her Sri Lankan and Malaysian heritage, her husband’s French cooking and even a little Italian food. She says her aim is to share excellent home cooking that anyone can achieve.
“The recipes I cook on Better Homes are exactly the recipes I cook at home,“ she says. “I’m a home cook. I’m a mum. I’m busy, I’m a normal person, and it’s recipes I think anyone can do because I’m in the same position as they are. We work, we’re busy. Because it’s Asian and there are different condiments being used doesn’t mean it’s hard. It just means you have to buy some of the ingredients you may not buy normally.”
Feildel says she taught herself how to cook not long after she moved to Perth from Malaysia to study at Curtin University in her early 20s. She says while there are plenty of excellent Malaysian restaurants in Perth, when she was craving a taste of home she soon realised she would have to get in the kitchen herself.
“There was a community at Curtin University of Malaysians and Singaporeans, and there was a Malaysian restaurant that we used to go to in (East) Victoria Park, Ten Ten Kitchen. That’s where we went when we were missing home cooked food, but they didn’t cook mum’s food. So that’s where I really kind of found the love for cooking, because I just wanted to have mum’s food and grandma’s food, so I started to cook myself.
“That was the pivotal point of when I started to learn to cook, I had to remember how it tastes. I used to sit in the kitchen when grandma used to cook and watch her, so it was already instilled in me, home cooked food. It came quite naturally. Everyone at university liked my food, and still today they say ‘I remember you cooking this and that!’ I experimented a lot on my friends at uni.”
Feildel says since she first moved to Australia 30-odd years ago, she has witnessed the country’s culinary horizons expand.
“It is so much more diverse, so many more people are much more daring and more adventurous about tasting and having different cuisines in their homes. It’s so lovely to see,” she says. “That’s what gives me joy when I’m on Better Homes And Gardens, is actually talking about the love of cooking different cuisines. I don’t just cook Asian dishes either. I’ve learnt how to cook Italian and it doesn’t need to be difficult recipes.”
She says one kitchen trick she has picked up from her famous husband is the wonder of butter, which she says can even make Asian dishes — where the condiment is not usually found — taste better.
“Butter, it really does make everything taste good. Put a knob of butter in something and it elevates the taste,” Feildel says. “My recipes are not completely traditional. They are my versions of recipes so I do make it the way I like it or my family like it. I think cooking can be changed and swapped to your taste. I think people get too afraid to mix the ingredients, and that’s how you learn.”
Feildel says in the upcoming season of Better Homes And Garden’s she is focusing more on sweets than she has done so in the past.
“I do a sweet slice that had everyone fighting over who gets the bigger piece,” she said. “There are going to be new recipes, new DIYs, it’s going to be a great, great season.”
Better Homes And Gardens is on February 13, 7pm on Seven and 7plus.
