🍯 Not DRNKS: Morgan McGlone is a Potter Now!

The only place you can buy the chef’s ceramic wares is here. Here’s the backstory to Ryo’s Pottery. 

Here’s a cool COVID project. Chef Morgan McGlone has subbed fried chicken for ceramics! We feel very proud to be the ~ exclusive ~ stockist of his Ryo’s Pottery collection - fermenting crocks, a moon vase, incense burners, ramen bows, regular bowls, planters and coming soon - decanters and matching ceramic wine cups. No ashtrays. No plates. The second they’re here, they’re gone, which either means a lot of people are fermenting a lot of stuff, or they’re just cool. You decide.

Morgy’s mum is a ceramicist, and he grew up hanging around her backyard studio and later, the ceramics school she attended in Lillypilly. “I hated going there,” he says. “It was for old people. But I remember it resonating with me that it would be something I'd come back to.” When COVID struck and he had a lot more time on his hands, he upped the ante. 

The chef says he’s “not a creative artist person”, which seems wrong, since the Belles Hot Chicken Sandwich is clearly ART, but what he means is he’s doing it for enjoyment and expression, not kudos. “I took up pottery in March 2019 as something other to do than going out and drinking in restaurants - I wanted another hobby that wasn't surrounded by hospitality. It felt really easy, because it’s sort of like cooking in a sense, creating a shape from a raw material.” Also - COVID. People were/are spending a lot more time at home, working on projects in the kitchen. “Everyone wants to be David Zilber,” says Morgy. So fermenting crocks glazed in earthy shades took the first focus of his wheel - they’re made for kimchi, chilli sauce or sauerkraut. Next came his ‘COVID casseroles’ - “two-person casseroles for the crib. You wanna Netflix and chill and put on a little beef stew? This is perfect.”

Don’t get too jazzed over a new dinner set by Morgan McGlone anytime soon, he’s just keen to do things he knows he can do well under Ryo’s Pottery, which is named for his son. “I don’t want to use casts, it’s not really pottery, I really enjoy the process and the craft,” he says. But, do excite yourself over his amphora decanters - porous ceramic jugs for wine as it used to be served a la antiquity, plus a matching wine cup. Each is different, as is the way with Morgy’s style, but we like it like that. It can take a sec to get used to drinking wine made from clay rather than fine glassware, we’ve gotten so used to fine things!! But the tactileness of these cups, and the glug of the wine being poured into it, feels a bit special, a bit ceremonial. Back to basics. Also clay, which is thicker than glass, maintains the wine’s temperature for longer. So many positives, so little negatives. Wine art.