A Navy chef with diverse experience in restaurants, cruise ships, food trucks and the mining industry has integrated smoothly into a tight-knit chef team on board the destroyer HMAS Hobart.
Maritime Logistics Chef Able Seaman Daniel Crowther joined Navy in August 2021 after COVID-19 pandemic restrictions hit the hospitality industry hard in his home state of Western Australia.
“It just killed everything,” Able Seaman Crowther said.
He was consulting at a rural hotel in outback in WA and had a burrito truck and a paella truck.
“Rather than rack up some kind of horrible debt or get behind and have to apply for government assistance I just got out of everything and enlisted,” Able Seaman Crowther said.
He chose the Navy as his parents had done decades earlier.
His mother was in the Women’s Royal Australian Navy and his father was a Maritime Technician Propulsion.
“I went around to my dad’s house just for a couple of drinks on a Friday night. We were sitting in his shed and we just decided to fill the application out online,” Able Seaman Crowther said.
He went through Navy’s Recruit School at HMAS Cerberus and did two weeks of category school.
“It was basically theory testing and a lot of practical assessments to prove I had the skills I said I had,” he said.
He was first posted to HMAS Stirling and then loaned to Hobart for an Indo-Pacific regional presence deployment.
Maritime Logistics Officer Lieutenant Commander Ben Jenson said Able Seaman Crowther brought a wealth of industry and personal experience to the Navy.
“The employment security offered by the Navy has provided the opportunity for Able Seaman Crowther to keep doing what he loves, so much so that he’s actively trying to recruit other experienced chefs from his past,” Lieutenant Commander Jenson said.
“Coming from a heritage of Naval service, he joined with a good understanding of the requirements of the Navy and an excellent attitude towards what he can do to contribute most to the organisation.”
Hobart is one of three Navy ships conducting a regional presence deployment through the Indo-Pacific region.
During their deployments, HMA Ships Hobart, Stalwart, and Arunta are undertaking exercises and engagements with Australia’s regional partners.
The ships are also conducting engagements as part of Indo-Pacific Endeavour 2022 in Vietnam, the Philippines and Timor-Leste.
