Born Barry Zonfrillo in Glasgow in 1976, he began working in kitchens at the age of 13 and began his apprenticeship at Turnberry Hotel at the age of 15, becoming one of the hotel’s youngest-ever apprentices.
At the age of 17, he began working for the renowned British chef Marco Pierre White. In his 2021 book Last Shot, Zonfrillo disclosed that he was homeless and addicted to heroin at the time. He was only 22 when he was appointed head chef at Cornwall’s Tresanton Hotel.
Zonfrillo became the head chef at Sydney’s Forty One in 2000, but he was fired in 2002 after setting fire to an apprentice’s clothes as a practical joke.
In Adelaide, he later opened various restaurants, including Restaurant Orana, Street ADL, Bistro Blackwood, and Nonna Mallozzi.
Restaurant Orana has received numerous accolades, including being voted Australia’s Restaurant of the Year by Gourmet Traveller magazine in 2018 and the Good Food Guide in 2019. It received three hats in 2019 and 2020 but was forced to close in March 2020.
Zonfrillo joined MasterChef Australia as a judge in 2019, replacing the show’s original hosts Matt Preston, George Calombaris, and Gary Mehigan. However, some of the stories he mentioned in his memoir were hotly debated.
His former boss, White, indicated that practically everything Zonfrillo published about him was false, and Zonfrillo’s claim of visiting hundreds of Indigenous communities was also called into question.
How many restaurants does Jock Zonfrillo have?
Zonfrillo opened a total of three restaurants in Australia. None are open right now. Indigenous ingredients were originally introduced to the gourmet dining world by Orana, which gained recognition on a global scale.