The perpetually busy life of chef, judge, and empire builder Matt Moran

When high school drop-out Matt Moran started out as a cook his sole aspiration was to be the guy on the grill at the RSL.

Now, the 46-year-old is one of the country's highest profile celebrity chefs, with eight restaurants, a catering company, four cookbooks, and the star of multiple cooking shows.

But there is one place you will never see Moran – promoting supermarkets like Jamie Oliver does for Woolworths and Curtis Stone and Heston Blumenthal do for Coles.

"I get why they do it," Moran says. "Good on them if they can bring something to those supermarket recipes. It's just not my thing.

"I love and support farmers and growers. The best way to buy fresh produce is to go to the farmers' markets. If there is a little bit of love about your cooking and you know where it's grown, it just tastes better."

Moran's focus on where food comes from is showcased at his popular Woollahra eatery Chiswick, where much of the produce on the menu is grown in the restaurant's kitchen garden.

The perpetually busy Moran's latest gig is co-judging The Great Australian Bake-Off with Maggie Beer. Despite the flop of Channel Seven's Restaurant Revolution, and SBS' plans for a 24-hour food channel, Moran believes we've yet to hit cooking show saturation point.

"People might say 'yes, enough is enough', but the highest rating TV shows are still cooking shows," he says.

"People's thirst for knowledge is driving it. People want to know what they're putting in their mouths, how it's done, how it's grown. The more people know about food, the better restaurants become, the better the cooking shows become."

Moran doesn't watch his own shows, but likes watching Anthony Bourdain and Ottolenghi's Mediterranean Feasts. "I like it when they travel, I'm learning something about the culture, I'm learning something about the food," he says.

Having sacrificed 15 years of his life "working bloody hard" to build his business, Moran says it would devastate him if he had to do without his restaurants. "My restaurants are my life," he says. "I love building restaurants, I love creating restaurants, I love working with a team."

Now he is dreaming up a flagship three-storey venue at Barangaroo. Due to open late next year, it will have an "amazing" rooftop bar, an "incredibly beautiful restaurant" pitched at city clientele on the middle floor, and a cheaper beer garden down below.

Moran says the Barangaroo venue is like all his other eateries, which include Opera Bar, North Bondi Fish and Aria in Sydney and Brisbane – situated in a stunning iconic location. While he loves his restaurants, his two Arias are the only ones at which he spends time in the kitchen. "But if you're on table seven and order the fish – it's not me cooking your fish," he admits.

He says he never consciously planned to build an empire. "It's just how it unfolds, what happens next. I take opportunities as they come, I don't think very hard about it."

But he is contemplating his own bakery. "Having eight or nine restaurants, the amount of money I spend on bread I might as well make it myself. One day I probably will."

While his relentless schedule means he is often away (he's in New Zealand this weekend), Moran says he tries to be home most weekends, when he enjoys cooking ("I find it really therapeutic") and hanging out with his 10-year-old daughter Amelia and 14-year-old son Harry.

Will they follow in his footsteps? "My kids love food, but they're smart enough to know that dad can do it for them," Moran laughs.

As part of Good Food Month's Month of Sundays event, diners can enjoy a Sunday Night Feast at Chiswick for $85 per person. For more information click here.