Adam Liaw: The reality star is on the hunt for Australia's national dish

Virginia Trioli
A little birdie tells me that you don't like talking too much about yourself personally.

Adam Liaw
I know that there are people who do. There are those people. I just don't know them.

Virginia Trioli
I'm Virginia Trioli and welcome to You Don't Know Me, the podcast in which I ask some of Australia's biggest names seven big questions.

Adam Liaw
When I became a lawyer I was like, 'This is the best thing ever!' And so I'm a little bit like a puppy in that respect.

Virginia Trioli
Another recovering lawyer here on the podcast, Adam Liaw, is here to answer the questions. His life changed dramatically when he won the second season of MasterChef and now he's on the hunt for Australia's national dish. Adam Liaw, welcome.

Adam Liaw
Great to be here, Virginia.

Virginia Trioli
How's that going, trying to find Australia's national dish?

Adam Liaw
You know, a national dish is not something that everyone agrees on. It's not something that is a term of art in any way but it helps the conversation around what a national cuisine is. You know, you can talk about, 'What's the national dish of China? What's the national dish of France?' and it tells you a lot about how people cook and eat there. And I think if you ask, well, not I think, I know because we asked people all around the country what they thought Australia's national dish is. We got a lot of different answers.

Virginia Trioli
What did you get? Tell me some of the answers you got.

Adam Liaw
We got everything from Vegemite on toast to Mongolian lamb to spaghetti bolognese to pavlova to scones, you know, roast lamb, chicken schnitzels.

Virginia Trioli
I'm up there with spaghetti bolognese, I tell you.

Adam Liaw
You know, I thought that we'd get a lot of spaghetti bolognese but there was not as much as I thought. You know, in my view, spaghetti bolognese, well, at least going into this series, spaghetti bolognese was our national dish. You know, when COVID hit and people rushed to the supermarket, we all bought the supermarkets out of the ingredients for spaghetti bolognese. You know, that was pretty telling to me.

Virginia Trioli
We all had mince in the freezer for months.

Adam Liaw
Mince and dried pasta and tinned tomatoes.

Virginia Trioli
Yep, that's it. That did it all. All right. Well, I suppose no spoiler alerts. You're not allowed to reveal what you come up with.

Virginia Trioli
Let's get to our questions. You'd never know it but I…

Adam Liaw
I don't like hard work.I cannot think of a day that I have not worked in memory. Like, honestly, I can't think of a day where I did not do at least some work, sit behind a computer or do something, you know, test a recipe or something. It's just constant for me. And I guess my work output in terms of, you know, number of TV shows and books and things is very high. But for me personally, I just don't like it. Not that I don't like it. I think that our – and not to get too philosophical – I think our approach to hard work is wrong and a scam. I think it's very good to work for yourself, to improve yourself, to work on the things that will make you a better person. But somewhere along the line, we've co-opted this idea of the morality of personal improvement for the exploitation of making people work for somebody else's benefit and calling that morally good or ethically good. You know, the fact that we call it a work ethic gives us this kind of moral connotation that has been transferred to, well, you've got to work hard in your job for the benefit of literally a corporation that in real terms does not exist. And that's as morally good and morally correct as working to improve your health or to spend time with your family. And I think that's wrong.

Virginia Trioli
But you started this out by talking about hard work. You don't like hard work. Is it possible then that what you're talking about, this very high output that you have, you don't define this for yourself as hard because it's joyous. I mean, you had a great legal career. You were a lawyer and you left that career and you auditioned for MasterChef and your life took a right turn there. So, was that the hard work and this isn't?

Adam Liaw
No. Like, I know that there are people who say, you know, love what you do and you'll never work a day in your life.

Virginia Trioli
Sure, sure.

Adam Liaw
I don't prescribe to that either. There are times that I, you know, no matter what I do, like I try to put the maximum effort into it and do it to the best of my ability. But it is hard, you know, even if you're enjoying it, it's still hard. You know, if you play sport, it's not like you don't feel like you're exerting yourself because you enjoy playing the sport. That's how I kind of feel about work. It's still hard. It still hurts. But I get a perverse kind of pleasure from it as well, I guess.

Virginia Trioli
Well, I did want to say if it does feel so hard and if you're doing so much of it, why do so much of it? What compels you to do that?

Adam Liaw
You know, I do think that it's drilled into us to work hard and that's how you get ahead. I think that statistics globally do not bear that out. You know, the hardest working countries are places like, in terms of hours worked, places like Nigeria and Mexico and they are not, certainly in financial terms, getting ahead more than people in other countries who don't.

Virginia Trioli
And life is harder there.

Adam Liaw
Yeah. So, it's not so much that I think hard work is a bad thing in and of itself. It's just that we draw some very strange connections to it in service of an economic system that is not in our own benefit. So, we say that, 'Work hard and get ahead!'when our economic system is literally predicated on the exact opposite of that. It's the exploitation of the labour of others that will get you ahead financially. And, 'Work hard and it's morally good and religiously good!' In fact, our faith systems are often based around hard work as well. But, again, I think that there are real character benefits to working to improve yourself and to improve your relationships with the people who are dear to you. And I don't think that you should mistake that beneficial, morally beneficial hard work for the type of hard work that we spend 17 hours at the office a day and you're a good person. You know, I don't think, in some ways, that's what we've come to believe and I don't think that's right.

Virginia Trioli
Adam Liaw is with you answering the questions on You Don't Know Me. I talked before about your life taking the right turn because, you know, you were an extraordinary student, clearly a very, very clever young man. You graduated from school at the age of 14, enrolled in university at 16 and completed a double degree. And you went on to have a career in the law before you decided... Now, I've heard you interviewed about that, about how, you know, your passion for cooking was something you simply couldn't tamp down. So, the next question is, the fork in the road I almost took was, and you can take this, given what we know about you, you can take this question wherever you like.

Adam Liaw
I guess I could have gone a lot of different ways. I think probably, you know, the obvious one is leaving a career in law to obviously going to cooking. But perhaps even before that, the reason I kind of got into law... I come from a very medical family. My parents are both doctors. My brother and sister are both doctors. And the reason I ended up going to law school was honestly just because I was meeting a friend for lunch one day. And he said, 'I've just got to go and drop in my application to go to law school.' So, 'I'll come with you. Then we'll have lunch after that.' And I was 16 at the time. And so, while he was there, just literally filling in the paperwork, I was like, 'I'll just fill it in too.' And that's how I ended up in law school. I was not one of those kids who at school was like, 'I'm going to be a lawyer.' I literally didn't even know what a lawyer did at that point.

Virginia Trioli
So, why did your pen hit the paper? Just take me back to that moment if you can.

Adam Liaw
I don't really know, honestly. It's just instead of fidgeting, I thought I'd just write down actual words. And it was literally, it wasn't like I had to write an essay. It was just like, yes, I would like to do this course, tick the box kind of thing.

Virginia Trioli
Was there an interest there or was it a gag?

Adam Liaw
No, there was no interest. Honestly, I had never in my life until that moment and actually through the end of that moment considered becoming a lawyer. But then when I guess I got accepted to it, I was like, 'Oh, okay, that seems like a good thing to do.' And so, I thought I'd give it a go.

Virginia Trioli
Were your parents surprised or displeased that you went in the legal direction, not the medical one?

Adam Liaw
No, they were very pleased, actually. I think they were doctors who did not want all of their children to become doctors. They were very happy with me becoming a lawyer, actually.

Virginia Trioli
And did you like being a lawyer? Because I know you worked for the Disney Corporation, I think, at one point in Japan.

Adam Liaw
I did, yeah.

Virginia Trioli
Was it fun being a lawyer?

Adam Liaw
It was. It was. I actually, I don't think I would have been well suited to being a doctor at all in the grand scheme of things.

Virginia Trioli
Why?

Adam Liaw
I don't like doing the same thing every day. So, I think the thing I like best about my career now is that I can choose different things to do literally on a daily basis.

Virginia Trioli
That's the great thing about a menu, hey? It's got several things on it.

Adam Liaw
Yeah, yeah. And, you know, I get the seven-year itch like everyone else does where they want to change what they're doing and maybe explore something new. And I like the fact that I've sort of landed myself in a position where I can do that more frequently than seven years. You know, I just sort of do it whenever I feel like it. I'll switch from one thing to another.

Virginia Trioli
Was there a light bulb moment or was there a moment where the room went still? Perhaps when you were auditioning for MasterChef or when you were, you know, right in the middle of that whole reality TV experience where you thought, 'Actually, this is the thing. This is the thing I want to do.' Did you have that moment?

Adam Liaw
No, I don't- In many ways, I think those moments exist only in retrospect. You know, as someone who tends to go through life without any particular grand plan, I think if you have a firm plan, you can see those points, those forks in the road where the plan comes to fruition or it's dashed against the rocks. But for me, you know, when I was auditioning for MasterChef, it was like, 'Oh, this is a bit of fun. You know, I'll give that a whirl.' I just really liked the storytelling aspect of it because I've been very into food my whole life. And that was, I guess, the first time in that audition process. The first MasterChef audition back then was not, 'Come and cook us some food and we'll see if it tastes good.' In fact, that kind of, I don't think that factors very largely into the MasterChef auditioning process. It's probably, it's more can you talk about it in a way that is personal and interesting.

Virginia Trioli
Are you going to be a good television character?

Adam Liaw
Exactly. Exactly. And so, the very first audition was you had to cook something ahead of time and bring it in.

Virginia Trioli
That's right.

Adam Liaw
Stand up and talk to people about it. And I reckon that was the first time I'd ever stood up in front of a room or in front of anyone and talked about food. And I loved it. I really thought that was the most exciting thing. And that's kind of what is taking me through my TV career now. I just love talking about food.

Virginia Trioli
And you do it terribly well. Adam Liaw is with you. We'll have to race through a few of these questions now, Adam. You and I have got lost in conversation. So, a lightning round coming up. I always ...

Adam Liaw
... Make my bed in the morning, even if I'm staying in a hotel. I know that's a little weird. But for me, if you don't make your bed in the morning, you're kind of getting the day off to a bad start.

Virginia Trioli
I think from memory, you might be the third or the fourth person to say that.

Adam Liaw
Really? Okay.

Virginia Trioli
Yep. And it's interesting. So, we're speaking to high-profile Australians, people who appear to have a great career, a position in life, and they are all, or at least four that I can remember off the top of my head, say make their beds. So, isn't that interesting?

Adam Liaw
Even my son made his bed this morning. And I went and remade it because I thought his day wasn't getting off to a good enough start.

Virginia Trioli
You be careful now. No Tiger Dad stuff, okay? I never ...

Adam Liaw
I never hate anything. I think a lot of people define themselves by the things that they dislike and they have very strong feelings. Like there are things that I dislike, don't worry, but to me that's not my personality and it's not who I am.

Virginia Trioli
Too much energy required?

Adam Liaw
Yeah, I think so. I think, you know, spending all that time closing your mind to something. Like there are things that I absolutely feel quite strongly about disliking, but I like to think that there's always that sort of 10% of my mind that's going to be open to it. And sort of question the way I might feel about something.

Virginia Trioli
What about foodstuffs? Is there a foodstuff that you just don't like?

Adam Liaw
The one that tends to surprise people is chocolate.

Virginia Trioli
Oh yes, I have heard you say that before.

Adam Liaw
Yeah, I'm not super into chocolate. That said, my youngest child had a, it was his birthday yesterday and he had a chocolate cake and I had a piece of that. It was quite nice. So, again, that's the 10% of me. Like I would never order a chocolate dessert if I was in a restaurant and I would never buy a chocolate bar. But if there was a chocolate dessert in front of me, I'd have a spoon of it and often quite like it.

Virginia Trioli
Are you a dessert... If you had to choose between sweet and savoury, is it an easy call for you?

Adam Liaw
Yeah, I think the older I get, the less of a sweet tooth I have. I used to very much have a sweet tooth. And certainly when it comes to cooking.

Virginia Trioli
Ah! I'm the exact opposite. As I get older, I've got more and more of a sweet tooth.

Adam Liaw
Well, I just, I can't do it. Like I'll make pancakes in the morning for breakfast and I'll really enjoy it. I always love the saying that all you can eat pancakes is four pancakes because you cannot eat more than four pancakes. And I'm at the point now where I can't eat more than two really. And even eating two pancakes with a bit of maple syrup means that if I don't do some fairly heavy physical exercise immediately following that by lunchtime, I'm just out for the count. So, I think I get worse with sugar as time goes on. But I definitely have a sweet tooth. But in terms of cooking, definitely I prefer to cook savoury than sweet.

Virginia Trioli
Adam Liaw, the time I got it terribly wrong was?

Adam Liaw
I don't know. I think.

Virginia Trioli
No, I think you do know. But I think you just may be reluctant to tell me.

Adam Liaw
I think, yeah. Well, I'm a very positive person generally. And I think if anyone is thinking of going on reality TV at any point, my advice would be just to be positive about the situation the entire way. And I tend to see the best in my situation, whatever it is that I'm doing. You know, I didn't feel like becoming a lawyer. And then when I became a lawyer, I was like, this is the best thing ever. And that was when I was actually an environmental lawyer at the start of my career. And then I switched to intellectual property. I was like, this is the best thing ever. And so, I'm a little bit like a puppy in that respect. But I think there was a period where I was – when I was living in Japan where I was just looking at the whole thing very negatively. You know, it's like I don't speak Japanese all that well. This was early on in my time there. And, you know, I'm in this job that's really quite hard. And I made this massive move to leave, you know, the town that I'd grown up in to move to Tokyo.

Virginia Trioli
That's Adelaide.

Adam Liaw
Yeah. And I only know a handful of people. And, you know, maybe, you know, it was a bit destructive. You know, it was just all of that kind of in my mid-20s, just go out and drink heavily at the end of the week. I think I just got very negative about my situation then. And that's when I got it wrong, you know. Now – and I did rectify that after a couple of negative years.

Virginia Trioli
So, that's interesting. So, it's not about sort of having made a mistake. It's about falling victim to having a negative cast of mind. That's the error.

Adam Liaw
Oh, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. No, like I think you can make the best out of any situation, quite literally any situation you're in.

Virginia Trioli
Do you think so?

Adam Liaw
Yeah, absolutely. Even the worst of possible situations. And I say that having in my mind lived a fairly charmed life. Like, things have gone generally pretty right for me. So – and maybe that's just my way of looking at it. But I do think that there are – you can be positive about situations, you can be negative about them. And I think that the times where I feel that the situation was the worst for me had very little to do with the situation itself and more about how I was approaching it.

Virginia Trioli
It's a small thing, but I'm still so proud that I...

Adam Liaw
I'm very proud that I make dinner at home each night. You know, I'll be in the studio cooking literally all day and then come home and make dinner each night. To me, that's a very important thing to do.

Virginia Trioli
You've never skipped one recently?

Adam Liaw
No, I skip a few. We get takeaway all the time. But every night, I mean in the royal every night kind of way.

Virginia Trioli
Yes, okay. Well, you've got photographic evidence of it because, you know, Tonight's Dinner is a book. It's a famous Instagram page as well and we all look forward to it. But you make it look so glamorously beautiful and I love your Tonight's Dinner. But at the same time, I look at mine and I go, oh, it's nowhere near that.

Adam Liaw
That's good photography. You know, I like taking photos too, so I like to make it look good. But the actual process of preparing and serving the dinner is actually not time consuming at all.

Virginia Trioli
It's true. And a lot of those noodles, I can see that it's, you know, it's just the lovely trick of the light. And that's a simple bowl of noodles there. Even I know that. The final question, I'm actually really dying to hear the answer to this. Which way will you go? My secret pleasure or my guilty pleasure is, Adam Liaw?

Adam Liaw
Driving. You know, I, as someone with multiple young children, I spend an awful lot of time in the car as a taxi service. And sometimes my wife thinks that I'm being altruistic or generous by saying, 'Oh, no, I'll drive the kids to karate for the fourth night this week.' And then because quite often, honestly, it'll be an hour and a half, two hours in the car. And I love it. It's not so much the act of driving, but it's that the quiet time, you know...

Virginia Trioli
It's a little cocoon.

Adam Liaw
Yeah. Particularly at night time. During the day, if I'm driving, I'm usually on the phone, catching up on all the calls that I need to do. But at night, you know, I'm not doing work calls. And I can listen to some music. I can listen to an audio book. I really enjoy the time driving. And sometimes people think that it's a pain for a parent to drive their children around as constantly as we do. And I'm not exaggerating by saying it can be two hours, four nights a week. So I'm glad that I quite enjoy it.

Virginia Trioli
Are the kids getting on board with your musical tastes?

Adam Liaw
No. No, they really are not. I had a bit of Iggy Pop going in the car last night. But we've come to a... I don't know how a parent driving all of a sudden became the job of a DJ. But it's like if you guys get one song, you confer with yourselves about what that will be, and then I'll play one song. So it's not just all mine and not all yours because both of those paths lead to bad places.

Virginia Trioli
You Don't Know Me is presented by me, Virginia Trioli. It's produced by Joe Sullivan and Julz Hay with audio production by Michael Black. Next time you'll meet my last guest for this season of You Don't Know Me, but not my last ever. You may have heard the news that I've got a new gig hosting a primetime arts program for ABC TV in 2024. But there'll be more to come for the podcast. Thank you so much for your support, for listening, and all your great messages following each episode. Keep following me on the ABC listen app so you don't miss out.