Warm Chilli, Pumpkin and Lentil Salad
Eat it warm, straight from the oven in the winter, or serve it cold as a colourful addition to a summery feast.
About Anna
Considered one of Australia’s most loved female celebrity cooks, and with three cookbooks under her belt, Anna has won the hearts of many while hosting and cooking on shows such as Junior Masterchef (Channel 10), The Great Australian Bake Off (Channel 9) and The Best in Australia (Lifestyle Channel and ABC TV). She also has a highly successful kitchenware range.
Anna’s life has always revolved around music and food. She was a member of the internationally acclaimed all-girl rock band the “Jam Tarts” in the 1980s and ‘90s, at the same time as developing her culinary career in restaurants around Australia. Anna started her own catering company, the highly regarded “Deluxe Catering”, in Fremantle in the late 1990s.
Anna started behind the scenes in TV on ABC TV’s Consuming Passions with Ian Parmenter. She first stepped in front of the camera for a regular live cooking segment on Channel 7’s Perth at Five: combining her natural flair as a performer with her passion for cooking. It was a perfect fit. National TV called, and Anna starred alongside celebrity chefs Ben O’Donoghue and Darren Simpson in The Best in Australia, which became the top-rating programme for Lifestyle and earned multiple Logie nominations. Anna went on to film Quickies in My Kitchen for the Lifestyle Food Channel.
Anna is a passionate advocate for healthy eating. She is an ambassador for Jamie Oliver’s Ministry of Food, the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation and Foodbank. Her latest television program Anna Gare’s Cab Fare will screen on Channel 9 this October.
Career Highlights
The Day I cooked for the Queen
I’ll never forget the day I got a call from the premier’s cabinet: sounds like a lovely piece of wooden furniture, but it was actually a very important person on the other end of the phone requesting my cooking services for the Queen’s visit to WA for CHOGM.
At first I had to decline: I was booked in for a kids’ cup cake comp at home in Denmark (500km south of Perth) that very day. My response was greeted with an awkward silence at the end of the phone. The gentleman couldn’t believe that a cup cake was trumping an opportunity to cook for the Queen. After 5 minutes deliberation and creative thinking I called him back and accepted the Royal gig and managed to honour my cup cake comp commitments.
It’s a very long story, and I won’t go into the gruesome details but it did involve a chauffeur, a knight in shiny white limo, lots of security, a rubber inflatable boat, wet hair, another limousine and a helicopter in a “no fly” zone. It was an honour meeting the Queen and arriving at the cup cake gig in a helicopter made the kids think I was a megastar. One of the most surreal days of my life.
