Hal Tropp; Vegie
Curry Man; An Interview
With 29 years of creative experimenting in the
industry delivers mouth watering curries , vegan, gluten free
cakes and his own brand of roasted mueseli to various universities,
David Jones, cafes and restaurants. Those who have known Hal Tropp
from the days of Muchdoh Bakery, the first dairy-free, canesugar-free
wholefood bakery in Melbourne, will be pleased to know that they
can continue their love affair with his food.
Hal is a qualified gold and silversmith who
moved into the food industry when the price of gold deregulated,
so design parameters relating to taste, appearance and wearability
(in the stomach) are important. His first experience with vegetarian
curries came in his early twenties when he made a friend who was
a Sikh. Now he brings brings the principles of wholefood cooking
to curries and cakes.
During his travels (physical and spiritual),
he found a preference for a type of regional, peasant food rather
than new vogue cuisine or rich creamy sauces. This applied to
cooking curries meant creating meals that were not overcooked,
leaving vegetables whole and vital, with individual flavor discernible
and not overpowered by a particular spice.
Food experiences started with his Aunt Ellie,
an Austrian expatriate living next door who made traditional Austrian
tortes that his mother drooled over. When his father, born in
Poland and raised in Austria met his mother, born in Newcastle
NSW and who couldn’t cook, the stage was set. Hal learnt
about sending food failures to the rubbish bin. The coming of
age for his mother, he explains, was her first success at a flourless,
real European chocolate nut torte. “As a chld I wouldn’t
eat vegetables that were overcooked,” he says. Grey beans
or floppy carrots were not tasty or healthy he was pleased to
find later. He was the child with the raw vegetables on the side
of his plate.
What would he be doing if he was not in the
food industry? He is an artist, he says promptly, and his medium
is food. As an artist what is important is the creative process
and the final product is based on the questions asked and on the
design parameters. Though it is exciting to be creating something
new, whether it is food or a piece of fine art or a creative educational
program or some seminar (and he has done all of these), process
has greater value for him.
This leads to a conversation about what he does
when he is not cooking.He rolls his eyes and mentions the daily
routines of taking children to school, cooking meals, cleaning
and family stuff. Then he becomes serious and mentions the balance
between lifestyle and work. An issue that is important for a lot
of people, as it becomes obvious that in this day and age, families
cannot survive without two incomes. There needs to be money to
care of the family’s needs but time has also to be spent
on emotional, spiritual and physical wellbeing. The year 2000
was the year he decided to recreate himself as an artist, working
with pastels, semi abstract, inspired by nature, working on formats
from 1200 by 1200 to 1300 by 24000mm.
He reads widely and the book that he has been most influenced
by recently would be Conversations with God, Book 1. And this
leads to his most current sayings “ Every moment is a creative
expression of who you are and who you want to be”, and “Have
a heart of gratitude”.
Favourite dishes, he says are usually created
on the spur of the moment, inspired by an empty fridge and fresh
vegies hand picked from the garden. ( He is passionate about his
organic garden. ) Tonight’s dinner was young zucchini with
flowers, dwarf beans, snow peas blanched with fresh basil and
baby spinach, lightly dressed with organic olive oil, organic
apple cider vinegar, a pinch of celtic salt and a squeeze of organic
lemon juice on a bed of Australian jasmine white rice , served
with vegetable dahl. But the fridge did produce a slice of his
rich , moist, vegan gluten free, choc fudge cake using organic
ingrediants and Belgium chocolate that he served with chai tea
made with rice milk and sweeteed with palm sugar.
TOP
