At first glance, it is simply a beautiful old covered serving dish.
Its pale green glaze has softened with age, the edging shows signs of generations of use, and a finely detailed crest sits proudly on its side. Yet this dish carries far more than food. It carries a family name, a history of public service and a direct connection to Chef Ian’s English-Australian heritage.
For many Underground Chef members, Ian’s Japanese background is already an important part of his story. His mother Nobuko - known as Cherry - survived wartime Hiroshima, and Ian’s parents later faced enormous opposition as they fought to build a life together in Australia.
That history has shaped Ian deeply, both as a person and as a chef.
But the serving dish reminds us that another powerful family story also sits behind him: the Holroyd and Parker side of his family.
The crest features a winged griffin holding a coronet, accompanied by the Latin motto:
Componere Legibus Orbem
The words can be understood as:
“To bring the world into order through laws.”
It is a fitting motto for the Holroyd family, particularly because Ian’s great-great-grandfather was Sir Edward Dundas Holroyd, a respected barrister and judge of the Supreme Court of Victoria.
The underside of the dish is marked:
W. P. & G. Phillips, Designers
175, 177 & 179 Oxford Street
and 155 New Bond Street, London
These London addresses indicate that the dish was most likely designed or decorated during the late Victorian period, probably between approximately 1882 and 1889.
That date is particularly interesting because Sir Edward had been appointed to the Supreme Court of Victoria in 1881. It is possible that the armorial dinner service was commissioned for the Holroyd household around this important stage of his career, although the exact reason for its creation may never be known.
What we do know is that it was made specifically to carry the Holroyd crest and motto. This was not simply a dish selected from a shop shelf. It formed part of a family service created to represent the household to which it belonged.
Sir Edward’s eldest son was Arthur George Holroyd, Ian’s great-grandfather.
Arthur’s daughter was Mabel Venn Holroyd, affectionately remembered by the family as Granny Parker.
When Venn married Henry Ernest Parker—known as Harry—the Holroyd and Parker family histories came together.
The family understanding is that the serving dish passed down through the Holroyd family to Venn. It was later inherited by her son, Gordon Holroyd Parker, Ian’s father, and following Gordon’s passing it came to Ian.
The likely journey of the dish is therefore:
Sir Edward Dundas Holroyd
to his son Arthur George Holroyd
to Arthur’s daughter Mabel Venn Holroyd Parker
to her son Gordon Holroyd Parker
and finally to Ian.
It is a remarkable line of family ownership stretching across five generations.
There is another lovely part of this story that cannot be seen on the dish itself.
When Venn became a Parker, she did not allow the Holroyd name to disappear from the next generation.
Venn and Harry gave Holroyd as a family name to all their children—both daughters and sons. They were Parkers, of course, but each child carried their mother’s family name with them.
That is how Ian’s father became Gordon Holroyd Parker.
It seems to have been Venn’s way of preserving an important connection to her own family and ensuring that the Holroyd name continued into another generation.
The tradition did not continue into Ian’s generation. With hindsight, it feels a little sad that such a significant family name was not carried forward again.
Yet names are not the only way a family history survives.
The Holroyd connection remains in the family tree, in the stories handed down, in the values inherited by later generations and in this serving dish that still sits on Ian’s table.
The family history behind the dish is not only a story of ancestry or social standing. Across several generations, it is also a story of service.
Sir Edward served the community through the law and spent many years on the Supreme Court bench.
Venn’s husband, Harry Parker, served the people of Ringwood through local government and was Mayor of Ringwood on several occasions.
Venn herself devoted much of her life to community work and was later honoured with an MBE.
Their son Gordon continued that tradition. Along with his military service, Gordon worked tirelessly for veterans and received the Medal of the Order of Australia in recognition of his contribution.
Each generation served in a different way:
Sir Edward through the law.
Harry through local government.
Venn through community service.
Gordon through his country and his fellow veterans.
That same spirit of service can also be seen in Ian’s life. His career has not only been about cooking food. It has been about teaching, mentoring, sharing knowledge and helping people feel more confident in their own kitchens.
Ian’s Japanese and English-Australian histories may seem very different, but they share many of the same qualities.
Both sides of his family faced enormous challenges.
Both valued courage, loyalty, responsibility and service.
Both passed down stories that deserve to be remembered.
From his mother’s Japanese heritage came resilience, cultural traditions and a deep connection to food and family.
From his father’s Holroyd and Parker heritage came a history of law, leadership, civic responsibility and service to others.
Together, these histories helped shape the person our members know as Chef Ian.
Perhaps the most meaningful thing about the serving dish is that it has not been placed behind glass and forgotten.
More than 130 years after it was made, it is still being used for its original purpose: serving food to family and friends.
Its worn edges and signs of age do not diminish its beauty. They are evidence of the life it has already lived—of meals shared, tables gathered around and generations connected.
When food is placed into it today, the dish continues a story that began long before Ian was born.
It carries the Holroyd crest, but it also carries the memory of Arthur, Venn, Harry and Gordon. It connects Ian to a side of his family history that deserves to stand proudly alongside his Japanese heritage.
Its value does not come simply from its age, its maker or the family crest painted upon it.
Its true value lies in the people who once held it, the lives they lived and the fact that their story has not been forgotten.
Food has always been about more than what we place on the plate.
It carries our memories, our family traditions and the stories of those who came before us. Sometimes those stories are preserved in a recipe. Sometimes they remain in a flavour remembered from childhood.
And sometimes they are carried in an old serving dish, handed carefully from one generation to the next, still doing what it was always intended to do:
bringing people together around the table.
