Willin Low is a man who wears many hats. Literally.

“I have 300 trucker hats,” said the chef, restaurateur, philanthropist and, now, food show host. “I can literally wear a different hat every day for a year.”

Low is best known as the owner-chef of Wild Rocket and for putting modern Singaporean (or Mod-Sin) cuisine on the map, but we get to see the more intimate, dressed-down side of him on the Asian Food Channel’s (AFC) first original production, A Party Affair.

In each episode, Low presents three easy-to-make small plates for entertaining at home — wearing one of his trucker hats. “I showed them my wardrobe and they said, ‘We want to keep it real, so wear your own clothes’.”

And yes, the recipes featured are all his own, too.

But why do a show now? The timing, he said, was “just perfect”. AFC had approached him in 2005 to do a show, but he had been too busy setting up Wild Rocket. Now, with other successful ventures like Wild Oats, Relish and the pop-up cafe Compl(e)ments Of under his belt, he is ready. “And I think I’m a lot more confident in front of the camera,” he said.

Besides having appeared in numerous television programmes, he will also appear as a judge on the MediaCorp TV Channel 5 reality cooking competition show, Wok Stars, which starts next year.

BABY STEPS

Low is the first Singaporean chef to have his own show with AFC. When he looks back at how far off the beaten track he’s come, it’s “surreal”, said the former lawyer, who started out cooking in his university dormitory in the United Kingdom.

“When I quit my job as a lawyer to be a chef, my first instinct was to be a hawker because I thought, in terms of investment, it’d be a lot cheaper,” he said. “But if you had told me then, ‘One day, you’ll have five restaurants. Michelin-starred chefs will come to your restaurant. You’ll get invited to New York, London and Tokyo to cook. And then you will have your own cooking show.’ I’d have been like, ‘I’m not trained as a chef. What are you talking about?’”

It was sheer desperation that drove him to his current profession, and that, he said, is perhaps what Singaporean home cooks lack. “I would never have cooked if I hadn’t gone to the UK — it was necessity that forced me to cook,” he said. “You don’t find Singaporeans making laksa because you walk out and you can buy good laksa ... It’s too comfortable. It’s too easy.”

If there’s one thing Low doesn’t do, it’s to take the easy path. Instead of resting on the laurels of his fame and exposure, he spreads himself thin raising funds for his favourite charity.

“I do a lot of things outside the restaurant because every single cent that I make outside of the restaurant is donated entirely to a home in Beijing called Morning Star Beijing,” Low said. “This American couple takes in abandoned babies with severe heart conditions — the state orphanage says it has no money — and raises money for their surgeries, which cost between US$10,000 (S$12, 500) and US$20,000 per baby. And after the surgeries are done, they find homes in the US that will adopt the babies because, in China, no one wants to adopt them.”

And Low donates the fees he makes for every appearance or product endorsement directly to the home. “It gives me moral high ground to bargain for more money because I don’t keep a single cent,” he said. “You’re bargaining with the children, not with me.”

Earlier this year, he visited Morning Star Beijing for the first time. “The babies who are new, if you walk towards them, they cower, because they get abused in the state orphanage. If you look at them, they look away,” he said of that experience. “But if they’ve been in the home for six months or so, they run towards you and hug you because they get so much love there.”

PARTY OF ONE

Speaking of paternal impulses, it’s hard to escape from the fact that Low is known as the father of Mod-Sin — a style of cooking that gets a mixed bag of reactions.

“People are always very curious because Singapore food is actually very ‘fusion’ to begin with. Our Malay food has Chinese influences; our Chinese food has Malay influences ... I mean, mee goreng is unheard of in India because they don’t eat noodles, but here, we don’t think about it. So when you say ‘modern Singaporean food’, people are very receptive because they’re like, ‘What’s next? How has it evolved?’

“The negative thing is that people think I’m trying to replace traditional food,” he added. “I’ve never had such intentions. I have deep respect for traditional food. It’s where I draw my inspiration from. I’m always looking for a different way to showcase the food I love, not to replace it.”

Ironically, though, the host of A Party Affair doesn’t like to party. “I’m actually an introvert. So when I held parties at home before I opened the restaurant, they were always very intimate: Small groups of friends, no more than eight to 10 guests — and all very good friends. I hate to go to a party where I don’t know anyone. People think I’m this party animal. I’m not.

“I’m one of the most boring people in terms of parties. After work, I’m just exhausted. I just want to chill by myself, have a whisky and read a book.”

With Wild Rocket going on hiatus from the end of this month until March next year, Low should finally have some time to himself. He is looking for a new location with the same non-urban vibe as the Hangout Hotel, but that hasn’t been easy. “There is a high chance we might actually stay on the existing premises, but we will probably shut for six months and do a major revamp of the place. It’s still up in the air,” he said. “(But) it’s definitely going to re-open. I need a job!”

What: A Party Affair

When: Starting Nov 20 at 9pm

Where: Asian Food Channel (StarHub TV Channel 435).