Support Chef Frank Fawkner to feed people in need.

Frank Fawkner is Hunter Valley born and bred, and it shows in everything he cooks. He started in kitchens at 15, working at a café in the small township of Broke, before completing his apprenticeship at the Crowne Plaza Hunter Valley and heading to London, where he rose to sous chef at Tom’s Kitchen under a Michelin-starred mentor.

Returning home, Fawkner worked his way up to head chef at Hunter Valley institution Muse Restaurant, refining a style built entirely around the region he grew up in. In 2015, Fawkner opened EXP. Restaurant at Oakvale Cellar Door and Winery, relocating to Pokolbin Village in 2020.

EXP. has become one of regional Australia’s most talked-about dining rooms. In 2025, marking the restaurant’s tenth year, EXP. was awarded two hats in the SMH Good Food Guide 2026, named Regional Restaurant of the Year (a first for any Hunter Valley restaurant), and made Gourmet Traveller’s Top 100 Restaurants list — on top of Gourmet Traveller’s Best Destination Dining Award in 2024 and the Tripadvisor Travellers' Choice 'Best of the Best' title.

At CEO CookOff Newcastle, Fawkner brings a career built on the conviction that a region’s own produce, cooked with care rather than flown-in flash, deserves to be the whole point of the plate — a philosophy that sits naturally alongside OzHarvest’s mission to make sure that same good food never goes to waste.

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