A creative outlet during the Covid-19 lockdown

It was May 2020, our second-born was a mere two months old. Our first-born at almost two-and-a-half years old had learned to live within the boundary walls of our home. His school had closed - in fact we had a padlock on our gate, unsure how this global pandemic would impact crime in our area.

I was working from home, desperately trying to keep a company afloat in an unprecedented time. Carrying the weight of 100+ employees’ livelihood was not easy, and there were many tough decisions to be made and difficult conversations that were held over that time, in between toddler tantrums and little sleep.

Being stuck at home wasn’t all doom and gloom though. We felt incredibly blessed at the timing of my wife being on Maternity Leave, able to look after our two little ones while school was closed without having to balance work in between.

With no social engagements, we also found ourselves with a lot more time to spend together. Most evenings were spent in our kitchen, or outside by the fire, sipping on a glass of red while chatting about the oddity of it all.

The Roasted Dad is born

During that time, I realised even more than before that I obsessively love the business world despite the challenge it brings, the risk of losing it all and the many unpredictable variables that at times make me feel out of control. In a way I felt that cooking sometimes feels the same.

You cook with the ingredients you have, and sometimes it works, other times it all goes wrong and it flops.

During lockdown, I started to experiment with cooking more, trying out new techniques and buying different ingredients to create nice dishes with. To capture that journey, I opened a new Instagram account. It was in our kitchen, while enjoying a glass of red, that we threw a few name ideas around, until The Roasted Dad was born.

The idea behind this Instagram account was all about sharing my love for home cooking and enjoying it with those I love!

About Shawn Godfrey

Shawn Godfrey is an entrepreneur based in Cape Town, South Africa. After the Covid-19 lockdown saw his business in financial distress, cooking was the creative outlet that helped to keep him sane. To keep track of his recipes, and encourage friends and families to join him, he starts his instagram account The Roasted Dad.

Fast-forward to late 2021 - on a whim Shawn (encouraged by his wife Lianne) enters MasterChef South Africa. It is a crazy time of life: running a 200 people business and struggling to keep it profitable, two small children with a third on the way, and about to move into a new house. But when Shawn gets selected to be one of the 20 contestants participating in the fourth season of MasterChef South Africa, he decides to go all in. Leaving his 7-month-pregnant wife to look after their then three and one-year-old children, he battles it out and comes back home five weeks later with the trophy and a million rand prize money in his pocket.

It all started with an Instagram account, but The Roasted Dad is so much more now. Shawn has stayed his entrepreneurial self and whilst he hosts Private Dinner Parties and Cook-with-Me Demos, does Restaurant Take-Overs, he still runs the lighting company and several other businesses.

On his blog, Shawn shares Restaurant Reviews and Accommodation Reviews, and gives an insight into the wild and wonderful life he leads together with his wife Lianne, and their three children Aiden (6), Olivia (4) and Harvey (2).

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