Mathew Fury

Mathew Fury’s career has taught him that great cooking is as much about people as what appears on the plate. As head chef at Brisbane’s acclaimed Restaurant Two, working alongside David Pugh, he built a foundation in technique, discipline, seasonality, and classical cooking. Later roles at Hummingbird House, Queensland’s only children’s hospice, and The Common Good café at Prince Charles Hospital offered a different perspective on what food can mean. “You can cook the most technically perfect dish in the world, but if it doesn’t make someone feel something, or make their day a little better, then you’ve missed the point,” he says. Today, as Executive Chef at Silky Oaks Lodge, those two sides of his career come together: the precision of fine dining and a deeply personal approach to hospitality, expressed through food that feels generous, relaxed, and rooted in the Daintree.

The rainforest has also changed the way Mathew sees ingredients. Rather than beginning with a menu and sourcing what he needs, he often starts by walking the lodge’s kitchen garden, where more than 100 plant varieties grow on the site of a former tennis court. Finger lime, pandan, rosella, lotus root, betel leaf, and Davidson plum can become the starting point for a dish, alongside tropical North Queensland produce and the Asian flavours that influence his contemporary Australian cooking. “The garden is constantly giving you ideas,” he says. That curiosity extends beyond its borders, too. “When you first arrive, you see rainforest. After a while, you start seeing ingredients.” For Mathew, the goal is to give guests another way to experience this extraordinary landscape, one that might begin with an unfamiliar flavour and become part of their memory of the Daintree long after they leave.