But Cooper is definitely not like most kids. 

After a Year 11 work experience stint, the sports-mad lad fell in love with another team sport – commercial cooking.

“I just enjoyed the team environment at the Macksville Ex-Services Club, and I worked out pretty quickly that this was what I wanted to do,” he said.

“Teamwork, camaraderie, and that feeling when everything works – you can’t beat it, it’s the best feeling.”

So by the time Year 12 came around, the young culinarian had a pretty good idea where he wanted his work placement bid to go – the big smoke.

After securing a spot in one of the most talked about restaurants in Sydney, the teenage wonder permanently cooked his way into the heart and kitchen of one of Australia’s celebrity chefs – Colin Fassnidge.

“After my week of work experience the pastry chef was like ‘look if you want a job here, I reckon you could run a section’,” Cooper said.

“The day I graduated I got an offer to work at 4Fourteen.”

And so the fledgling cook was given his wings.

Cooper said he’s loved working there over the past year and a half, even if Sydney living has been a bit of an adjustment.

“It’s awesome – the food we do is great. The style isn’t pretentious, it’s just good food done in generous portions,” he said.

“And we change the menu once a week or every two weeks, so I’m never bored – we’re just constantly learning new things.”

After starting out on garnish, Cooper quickly earned his promotion to pastry chef and has been getting his head around the restaurant’s unusual dessert flavour combinations.

One of his latest favourites is a hay ice cream; a poetic twist given Cooper’s rural origins.

“We toast the hay, infuse it in the ice cream and let it sit overnight. The result is a savoury flavour that gets served with a quince tartin which is quite sweet so it balances nicely,” he said.

“We also have a bread and butter pudding ice cream which is served with a caramelised pumpkin slice.”

One of Cooper’s high school teachers, Beth McMillan, has followed Cooper’s progress with a keen professional interest; Beth is owner of the prestigious Burrawong Gaia poultry farm here on the Mid North Coast which supplies famous chefs like Kylie Kwong and Neil Perry. 

In fact, Beth recently nominated Cooper for this year’s Gault&Millau Young Talent Awards.

It was the first year the competition ran nation-wide, and it attracted in excess of 1400 entrants.

“For my competition dish I decided to use Beth’s poultry – I thought it would be a great way to express my gratitude for her nomination.

“I used duck hearts brined for half an hour to break down the fibres, then pan-fried and in a spring onion emulsion with baby pickled onions and grated horseradish.”

Cooper had originally intended to char grill the hearts, but had to think on his feet after discovering there was no char grill at the competition.

Despite the plethora of raw talent on show, Cooper Nugent cooked his way into the finals, placing him as one of the top eleven young chefs in the whole of Australia.

He may not have walked away with a blue ribbon this time round, but Cooper still had his own personal win.

“My competition dish went on the menu [at 4Fourteen] for a few weeks so that was a real compliment,” he said.

And his team at 4Fourteen just recently chalked up a huge win, earning a Chef Hat [the Australian equivalent of a Michelin Star] at the annual Good Food Awards.

“It was just the best feeling being the team who brought the Hat back,” he said.

But coming in at a close second on his impressive list of “best feelings” was his chance to meet the French culinary master himself, Marco Pierre White.

“He came into the restaurant and we got to make something for him – that was a top feeling too,” he said.

Cooper said the restaurant scene is slowly dying in Surrey Hills, where 4Fourteen is located, mostly due to the flow-on effects from lock-out laws.

And the restaurant will likely close come June.

But with his natural talent and proven dedication he’s not short on job offers.

In fact, he would like to come back to the Nambucca Valley eventually to possibly open his own gastro-pub.

And we here at Guardian News, are praying he does.

As another local gastronomic star – Clayton Donovan – recently said to him during a serendipitous Uber trip one Sydney evening : “Mate there’s been a few legends to come out of Macksville: there’s Phil Hughes, there’s Greg Ingliss, and now there’s you.”