I lost my love of cooking after 12 years as a chef. Moving to a pig farm restored it

Hospitality can be anything but hospitable to workers. But in regional Victoria, I found a community – and rediscovered something I’d lost Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email I was a keen-bean 15-year-old when I got my first job in a commercial kitchen in Canberra, raised on a diet of Jamie and Nigella and bursting with a passion for food. I dived headfirst into an apprenticeship and eagerly put my training into practice on my days off, cooking elaborate meals for friends and creating plenty of dirty dishes. But as the years went on, my love for the kitchen was dulled by a series of toxic workplaces, bullying bosses and long hours. Eventually, cooking for myself became a chore. I was more likely to eat cereal on my kitchen floor than do anything creative that would result in dirty dishes. Despite its name, hospitality can be anything but hospitable to the people working in it. It is an industry that takes more than it gives: your time, your energy, your passion. There wasn’t a single moment that drove me out of the kitchen. It was more a case of death by a thousand cuts over a 12-year career. In the end, it was the pandemic that caused a hard reset: forced to stop working,