At Firedoor in Sydney, Australia, chef and owner Lennox Hastie cooks local ingredients over a live fire, including one that’ll be overly familiar to anyone living on the continent. “Kangaroo [is] obviously a huge, endemic protein in Australia,” Hastie says. “It’s a very large wildlife resource that we don’t really tap into that often. I think it can be awesome. Like any ingredient, well-handled, well-hunted, treated with respect and love, can be fantastic.”
Hastie says the meat, from “a two-and-a-half-year-old red kangaroo,” is the least “game-y” of all the types of kangaroos, making it an ideal introduction to customers who have never tried the meat before.
Before the kangaroo meat goes onto the fire, it gets a light spray of grapeseed oil rather than a brush, because Hastie says it envelops the meat better, providing a better seal. Due to the heat of the live fire, the meat can’t stay on the grill for long.
“The great thing about cooking with fire is it has this really intense heat,” says Hastie. “The embers of the fire of the iron bar burn about 900 to 1,000 degrees celsius, and that gives you a beautiful sear on things like the kangaroo.”
The meat is plated and served with a pepperberry dressing, which is native ground pepperberry, grapeseed oil, and Australian vinegar.
Watch the full video to see how Firedoor makes its other dishes like queen scallops, dry-aged rib-eye, and more.