The Culinary Passport - S3 EP3: Justin Jennings - Downunder, Lisbon, Portugal
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Justin Jennnings
The Michelin Guide describes Downunder by Justin Jennings as an “Australian contemporary” restaurant in the heart of the picturesque São Bento district of Lisbon, the capital city of Portugal.
The Aussie chef began his career in the late 90’s after first training to be a cabinet maker.
“ I began working in kitchens as a dishy”, he told The Culinary Passport podcast.
“To start with I thought becoming a chef would be a good skill to have because I wanted to travel the world, but it wasn’t long before I realised I really liked working in the kitchen and things just took off from there”.
He began his apprenticeship at the age of 21 in 2003 at the West Tamworth Leagues Club in NSW, and the following year moved to Armidale to work in a chef hatted restaurant under Ben Mailing.
During this time he got his first taste of competitions winning the title of ‘ Northern west NSW Young Chef of the Year.
Justin completed his apprenticeship after two and a half years and then moved to Brisbane to work under the watchful eye of a former 2 Michelin star French chef at Vino’s on the city’s famous Eagle Street Pier.
He remembers this as a massive learning curve but also a very tiring period because of the long hours and attention to detail.
Like many young chefs before him he was in danger of ‘burning out’, but the experience didn’t put him off pursuing a career in fine dining and his next move was to Rydges Hotel on Brisbane’s Southbank where he worked under Todd Farm a winner of My Restaurant Rules, and Dan Denaro.
“Once again for me it was a time when I learnt a lot “, he says, “ and it helped point me in the direction of where I wanted my career to go”.
downunder receives michelin 2025 recommendation
That led him back to NSW, where in 2010 he took up his first head chef position at Whale Bone Wharf in Port Macquarie.
It was the first time he’d been in charge, and was also his first attempt at building a team.
whalebone wharf - Port Macquarie
“It wasn’t all plain sailing because when I arrived at Whale Bone I was still quite young and there were others in the kitchen who thought they should have been considered for the job”, he says.
“But I’m not a dictatorial type of person and eventually that helped me build a team in Port Macquarie and I learned lessons for the future”.
Over this period he also completed a teaching degree as a commercial cookery teacher at TAFE NSW, a job he found very rewarding and hopes to return to at some stage in the future.
By this time Justin had met his wife Sofia who is Portuguese but was living in Australia and the couple now have two sons.
“In 2015 we decided to go and live in Lisbon with the idea of opening a restaurant”, he said.
“I’d been to the country several times and really liked the place. Sofia knew all about living in Australia and it was time for me to go and find out more about her home.”
They arrived in the Portuguese capital and began searching for a suitable site to open a restaurant.
“While we were doing this I was using some of my cabinet-making skills and renovating an apartment we’d moved into”, he said.
“That’s when I got a call asking if I was interested in going to Hong Kong to work as a chef/consultant for an organisation opening five restaurants in three months.”
“It was a pretty intense time and once again I was working long hours.
“I’d be up early in the morning and wouldn’t finish until the early hours of the following day when I’d be walking home and looking for some where to eat a few noodles before going to bed.
“Looking back it was another interesting time but I’m a country boy at heart and working in a massive metropolis like Hong Kong was not for me on a long term basis”.
Back in Lisbon, and still looking for a restaurant site, Justin began working as a private chef, a role he continues to play.
“Downunder by Justin Jennings”….opened in 2017, and since then has gone from strength to strength.
Dial up ChatGPT and this is the description you get:
At the heart of the restaurant lies a bold ethos: to take diners on an “exotic” culinary tour—from the Australian outback to the backstreets of Lisbon—through unusual ingredients and techniques.
Patrons can try kangaroo tartare crowned with truffled caviar, crocodile salad with nahm jim, or the 36-hour slow-roasted pork belly—all featuring expertly balanced sauces and spices reminiscent of Asia-Pacific flavours.
These signature dishes, alongside staples like corvina fish and Angus sirloin, demonstrate a respectful synergy between Australian ingredients and Portuguese terroir.
Since setting up the restaurant Justin has also become a TV star.
In 2022 he was invited to take part in an international culinary competition called “The World Cook” and shown on Amazon Prime.
Justin Jennings on set of The World COOK
Competing against 15 chefs from around the world, and traveling through the UK and Europe, Justin won the final which was staged at Playa del Carmen in Mexico, where he became the first ever champion of “The World Cook”.
“Winning that has certainly helped my private chef business because the show was very popular particulary in the UK and other European countries”, he said.
In 2024 “Downunder by Justin Jennings” became Michelin recommended and was added to the Michelin guide.
“Like other restaurants we had suffered after the Covid pandemic so this came as a real boost for the team here, and very quickly brought more customers in”, he said.
Looking to the future Justin thinks Australia could again feature on his ‘culinary passport’ in the next few years when he may consider splitting his time between Portugal and his homeland.
“But not right now because we’re enjoying ourselves here”.
