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Few people outside of Peter Brinkworth’s friends and family know that he invented chicken salt, or that it is even Australian.
Now the South Australian man, who is as unpretentious as his creation, is getting his moment in the sun with a short film set being released about the tastemaker called Salt of the Earth.
“The other day my wife kissed me and said, ‘I just kissed a movie star,'” Mr Brinkworth, now 81, told the Daily Mail Australia.
“I’m very flattered and I honestly can’t quite believe it.”
Outside of Peter Brinkworth’s friends and family, few people know that he invented chicken salt, or that it’s even Australian
Chicken salt is celebrated in his hometown of Gawler, especially at a restaurant named after the classic Aussie seasoning, which is called Extra Chicken Salt. It even has a chicken salt flavored beer on tap?
Compared to the greatest Australian inventions ever, chicken salt may not have saved lives like the black box flight recorder, or even improved it as much as the cochlear implant.
But due to its huge popularity, with chicken salt having colonized every takeout shop that sells hot chips, it is the equal of any of them.
The film, called Salt of the Earth, recalls the origins of chicken salt and how far it has come.
“You must be amazed, it was just an idea, but I suppose most good inventions just start out as someone’s idea.”
Mr Brinkworth tells Daily Mail Australia he has “no idea” how he got it or how much money he made from it.
But he knows damn well how good it is: good enough to put his eggs on for breakfast and on his steaks every morning, 50 years after he came up with the recipe.
Mr Brinkworth first mixed and sold chicken salt from the Gawler’s Ozone Theater just above the roundabout in the photo above
Now the South Australian man, who is as unpretentious as his creation, is getting his moment in the sun with a short film set being released about the tastemaker called Salt of the Earth
Peter Brinkworth, the son of a chicken farmer, worked for his father and later for his older brother, Tom, who eventually became one of Australia’s largest livestock farmers.
After working as a delivery boy for a while, Peter opened his own chicken shop and wholesaler of frozen chickens in his thirties, just as chicken shops were starting to take off in South Australia.
“In the 1970s, there were chicken shops all over SA, but hardly any between the states,” he recalls.
Mr. Brinkworth sold the recipe and his chicken wholesale business in 1979 to the immigrant family business Mitani, which marketed chicken salt
“We were in the industry and we also had a chicken shop, and I decided I wanted to give the chickens on the rotisseries a flavor enhancer rather than a little bit of this and that. So I came up with a mixture.’
In his shop, in the old Ozone Theater, he mixed his first servings of chicken salt.
Mr Brinkworth can’t recall how long it took him to get the mix right: ‘I don’t know, it was 50 years ago.
“I just got it mixed up and that’s it.”
He does admit that he added ‘unspecified herbs and spices’ to the description as ‘a joke’.
The recipe is no secret – onion powder, garlic powder, salt and celery salt, paprika, chicken stock and monosodium glutamate.
‘We supplied other stores with frozen chickens. I talked to guys who bought the chicken and did it on some shipments and it went well.’
The seasoning soon became popular with other local chicken and fish shops.
“We sold it pretty quickly in one-pound bags,” he said.
Peter Brinkworth, the son of a chicken farmer, opened his own chicken shop when he was in his thirties and decided to make a seasoning for rotisserie chickens
Mr Brinkworth’s role in making chicken salt was unknown until 2018 when his daughter Jodie (pictured centre) told a mate at the University of Adelaide that her father was famous. That friend was chef Adam Liaw, who went on to become Masterchef. won
But Mr Brinkworth decided to sell in 1979 and take up farming work, which he continued to do for the next 20 years.
‘We’d worked ourselves to the bone, we’d had enough.’
Mr. Brinkworth sold the recipe and his wholesale chicken business in 1979 to the immigrant family business Mitani, which marketed chicken salt.
After selling it to takeaways across the state, they eventually created a grocery store version.
“It’s the Mitani family who made it known. They got the idea from us and promoted it.’
Today, chicken salt is celebrated in its hometown of Gawler, especially at a restaurant named after the classic Aussie seasoning, which is called Extra Chicken Salt.
The restaurant even has a chicken-salt flavored beer on tap.
It may have been over 40 years since he sold his invention, but he’s still a passionate advocate for chicken salt, pointing out that it has many more uses than chicken and chips.
He puts chicken salt on his eggs every morning, but also on steaks when his six children or 17 grandchildren come to visit
Mr Brinkworth can’t remember how much he sold chicken salt for, but says he “don’t care about the money.”
“I wouldn’t have a clue, it was 40 years ago, I wouldn’t know if it was a thousand or 50,000.”
Mr Brinkworth’s role in making chicken salt was unknown until 2018.
His daughter Jodie boasted to a friend from college, Adam Liaw, that her father had invented chicken salt.
Liaw, who studied science and law at the University of Adelaide, won Masterchef in 2010 and wrote about her friend Jodie’s claim in a 2018 news article for the guard.
It may have been over 40 years since Mr. Brinkworth sold his invention, but he is still a staunch supporter of it, pointing out that it has many more uses than chicken and chips.
He and his 46-year-old wife, Helen, still have chicken salt “on our eggs every morning for breakfast.”
He also uses it as steak seasoning when his six children and 17 grandchildren come to visit.
“I think it should be on every table in every pub in the country,” he said.
But he does want to dispel some misconceptions about it.
First, neither chicken nor salt are essential ingredients.
Even though the recipe includes chicken stock – that doesn’t mean it has to include chicken.
“Chicken stock is often just made from vegetables,” he says.
‘And not too much salt, it should be less than half. The taste comes from the other ingredients.’
Mr Brinkworth sticks to his version of chicken salt, which he says is the original and the best.
Peter and Helen Brinkworth (center of photo) with filmmakers Thomas Van Kalken (far left) and Jacob Richardson (far right)
If there’s one ingredient you shouldn’t leave out, it’s the MSG, he said.
“It’s essential,” he says, vehemently denying that it’s bad for anyone.
“It’s been proven time and time again that it’s a misconception that it’s bad for you,” he said.
“If people really knew what it is, they wouldn’t worry. It’s basically what you get from matured cheese, matured meats and mushrooms, it’s that extra flavor of a matured product.”
Salt of the Earthcreated by Jacob Richardson and Thomas Van Kalken, it debuts at the Adelaide Film Festival on October 20.