Guest chef finds new fish to fry at the end of the jetty

Having worked as the head chef of a Michelin-starred restaurant, Guillaume Zika thought he knew his fish. That was until he reached the end of a jetty at Balmoral Beach.

''I saw this big sign with all this fish I had never seen before. I only knew, like, two. The flathead has a crazy head,'' the Frenchman said with a laugh. ''I caught one and thought that's a fish I'm not going to eat. But I liked it.''

Zika moved to Sydney in June after an 18-month stint as head chef of Hibiscus, Claude Bosi's two Michelin-starred restaurant in London. He is the international guest chef at Public Dining Room at Balmoral Beach until December.

While he has yet to be won over by the ''mushy and strangely textured'' barramundi, he is savouring the best of Sydney's fine dining scene.

''It's very relaxed here and you can eat very good food wearing casual clothes,'' said Zika, who counts Sixpenny, Four in Hand and Oscillate Wildly as favourites. ''You don't need to have 10 waiters serving you in suits, and you don't need the table cloths and other fine dining trimmings to enjoy great food.''

Local chefs are relishing his presence, including chef Daniel Puskas of Sixpenny in Stanmore, who said Zika was a ''great coup'' for Sydney. ''It's a good opportunity for chefs who cannot afford to train overseas and I don't want to lose him to Melbourne or Brisbane,'' he said.

The Michelin guide has not yet covered Australia's gastronomic offerings but there is a growing network of chefs in Sydney who are returning from Michelin-starred proving grounds.

Puskas, 31, who opened his 36-seater restaurant with fellow chef James Parry last year, said experiencing the ''intensity and discipline'' unique to high-pressure kitchens such as Alinea in Chicago helped him succeed. ''When service begins, it's game on. I've learned to forget about everything else except the customers, the service and the food.''

Chef Mark Best credits his training at L'Arpege in Paris and Le Manoir Aux Quat'Saisons in Britain in the late 1990s as the trigger to open the two-hatted Marque. ''It was like jumping from the frying pan into the fire,'' he said. ''Those who go tend to come back new chefs, if not new people.''

In the past decade, Best has witnessed greater movements of young chefs between Australia and Europe.

''I organised my move by writing letters, it was pre-email, pre-Google. Now so many are going over and it's hard to keep any talent onshore. Then they come back wanting an elevated position.''

Troy Crisante, a 23-year-old chef at Quay, is preparing for his first foray into European Michelin restaurants, with his sights on the Ledbury in London and Noma in Denmark.

''I think it's a rite of passage for Australian chefs now,'' said Crisante, who knows up to 30 young Australian chefs toiling overseas. ''When you go overseas to work at Michelin restaurants, it's not a holiday that's for sure. It's an investment for future prospects.''