Stan Sarris and Liam Tomlin

In the restaurant industry he can practise a range of passions – food, wine, people, design, business – and, find an element of creativity in it all.

Stan Sarris is not a chef but is chief of some 45 chefs working in the Martin Place food and beverage empire he has developed with Rodney Adler over the past four years.

At one end of Martin Place is the much celebrated Banc Restaurant with its adjoining Wine Banc, Private Banc and Mint operations. And at the other end of Sydney’s commercial heart is the huge GPO at No 1 Martin Place.

The Banc complex started three years ago with Executive Chef, Liam Tomlin, and Cellar Master, Remi Bancal, involved in the planning for three months prior to opening. Behind it all is the partnership of Stan with businessman, Rodney Adler, with whom he has been friends for 17 years.

And it’s the same team, along with Sydney provedore, Simon Johnson, who have been responsible for the most recent development of the GPO..

Though Stan is very much the entrepreneur these days, he started in food.

"Growing up in a Greek family, my father came from Crete, I have always loved food and wine."

After studying economics and working part time at McDonalds he learnt about the essential elements behind restaurants – which he says are, "knowing the value of training, discipline, consistency and an understanding of accounting systems."

His first venture a decade ago was at Rogues then two years later in 1991 he opened Paradiso, a small coffee bar in the city which led to another four Paradisos which he eventually sold as a group.

"I had my eye on the GPO site since 1991 but the development did not become possible until late 96/97.’

In 1996 he opened the very individual Vetro and soon after began the pursuit of the dream of the food empire in Martin Place.

First came the old National Bank offices which he spotted some time earlier but after a lot of research and planning, and constant talking to the owners of the building, he persuaded them to consider putting in food. "They had wanted a dry use, but my surveys showed them it would work. But I must have been too persuasive because they then decided they could do better by putting it to tender. It was a very strong and competitive field but my bid eventually won in September 1996."

Then there was the battle to get a liquor licence. Not just a restaurant licence but one which would allow him to have –Wine Banc ( a very successful wine and cigar bar) and Mint (a classic New York style bar). Though there is a good and interesting menu at Wine Banc, the old hotel licence which Stan bought (reportedly for an amount in excess of $250,000) means that drinks can be served on the property without food. At the time of writing changes are gradually taken place in the licensing laws in NSW but it still costs a substantial amount to acquire that sort of license.

For Stan the creation of the business that he wanted with the Banc complex was the same as a chef planning a menu. The place, the food, the wine list – all had to fit within a style which he had decided on. Much of that came from his own vision and, he admits, from looking at ideas in Europe, particularly in London, and in New York. Though he looked at and admired the big restaurants there (places such as Quaglino’s and Mezzo), he has not tried to make one large outlet rather to divide up the spaces to accommodate different markets each with their own distinctive concept, price point and design.

At the most recent development at the old General Post Office, there are five food operations – Prime, the upmarket steakhouse, Post, the brasserie; Sosumi, the sushi bar, Espresso GPO, eleven sections in GPO Produce, the food store (a joint venture with Simon Johnson) and Tank – the bar.

And as with a chef, in creating a dish, the development of these is about clarity of vision, of taste and of having the technique (in building this encompasses the architectural and engineering advice and the finanical muscle) to bring it all off.

"It had to be seamless," says Stan, "all the areas have their own little nooks, but the totality fits seamlessly."

Menus have been designed by Liam Tomlin (whose recipes follow) and all liquor purchases organised by Remi Bancal (who has now gone to Tasmania to run a guest house).

Liam Tomlin is Irish, classically trained in some of the top European hotels. He came to Australia in 1991 where he worked with Dietmar Sawyere at The Regent (now Sofitel) Melbourne. After coming to Sydney as executive sous chef at the Park Lane Hotel (now Sheraton) he then went to work with Dietmar at Forty One as Chef de Cuisine and as Executive chef at Brasserie Cassis. He joined forces with Stan Sarris three months before the opening of Banc. There his menu has a strong French bias. It was a deliberate choice by Stan, who felt at the time of opening Banc, that "there was too much Asian mix, and I’m fed up with Italian." His sense of the market’s shift in taste has proved correct as Sydney has chosen to overwhelmingly embrace French cuisine at the end of the century. As Stan says, "French is a highly respected cuisine in terms of technique and craft and, it’s not something people do every day at home. So when they go out, they want something they can’t do themselves."

However at the more casual Post Brasserie at GPO, headed by chef Darryl Felstead, the emphasis is Mediterranean. Stan enjoys a lot of input into the menus, "I don’t dictate but I do give my clear opinion and we work through it. But ultimately its up to the chefs because they are responsible and accountable for a menu that can work and that can meet our requirements for food costs."

This is after all about business and big business at that, it is anticipated that the total turnover of all the Martin Place operations will be around $30 million in the year 2000. Considering the quality of fit out the partners have chosen, the staff and produce used and, most significantly, an area close to 4000 sq metres of prime Sydney real estate to pay for, the amount makes sense.

Little wonder that Stan now says, "I’m not too keen on doing something else and building again. There’s no need to expand, we’ve got the platform here, we’ve got the canvas. We just want to keep making it better."

INFLUENCES

Stan Sarris – Ambition; food and wine; John Pegrum, his original partner, a dear friend and remarkable human being.

Liam Tomlin – Bruno Enderli, executive chef Hotel Central, Zurich

A review of Banc Restaurant

Liam Tomlin and Stan Sarris's Recipes

Roast fillet of salmon with sauteed yabbie and asparagus
Winter truffle risotto with wild mushrooms and asparagus
White chocolate and passionfruit custard