Former SPC staff member Joseph (Joe) Phyland, who always referred to himself proudly as a cook and not a chef, sadly passed away on 21 June 2025, aged 89 years.
Joe’s Funeral Mass is to be held at Nazareth House in Ballarat on Wednesday 2 July at 10am.
Joe was the cook in the College kitchen for 40 years with his dedication recognised with College’s new Boarding Precinct kitchen named in his honour, The Joe Phyland Kitchen.
Even after retiring, Joe continued to cook for some of the Christian Brothers and continued to drop into the College to keep in touch with staff, many of whom became good friends.
Joe began work at St Patrick’s College in 1963 and by the time he retired four decades later, he had served up thousands of meals to students and staff.
Joe and his team dished up breakfasts, lunches and teas to boarders and nearly 40 Christian Brothers, then living on site, on a daily basis.
It was thought Joe prepared around 540 meals a day in the kitchen at St Patrick’s College, according to a story published in the 1988 College Annual.
“Since he commenced in the kitchen on October 31, 1963, he would have prepared well over 3,000,000 meals for hungry St Patrick’s boarders.”
Joe worked under 11 different Headmasters, including Br VI Murphy (1961-63), Br JL Kelty (1964-66), Br PB Murphy (1966), Br MB Stallard (1967-69), Br RS Stewart 1970-72, Br PG Nangle 1973-78, Br WJ Wilding 1979-84, Br TF Kearney 1985-88, Br KG Buckley 1989-91, Br LB Collins 1992-2001 and Dr PM Casey 2002-14.
Br Wilding recalled recently of giving Joe the task of successfully reworking the boarders catering budget after discovering it was the biggest expense of the College when he took over as headmaster in 1979.
Boarders would remember Joe’s Sunday roasts with gravy, grilled sausages, eye fillet steak, spaghetti bolognese and golden syrup dumplings.
Joe recalled working three months straight – without a day off – at one stage.
However he fondly remembered – and many boarders probably still do to this day – the “boarders strike” over his braised steak.
Joe also recalled catching out one of the boarders using his boiled eggs, served up at breakfast, for bowling practice.
Joe said he was “tickled pink” when he was invited to check out the state-of-the-art Joe Phyland Kitchen in person back in 2021 and that it meant a lot to him to be recognised by the College.
