Catalina - Rose Bay

I have been intending to dine at Catalina ever since I was given a voucher from some lovely friends for this waterfront restaurant. However, due to one reason or another (atrocious weather, unable to make a booking, etc) its taken us a while to get here. Lucky for us, we had chosen an amazingly sunny fine day to eat here - meaning that we had a spectacular view to accompany our wonderful meal.

We were initially going to share an entree but all those choices sounded soooo delicious that we ended up ordering both the marron and the pork belly (and were disappointed that we couldn't order more entrees).

Just as our view was picturesque, so too was our marron. It looked stunning, being surrounded by seasonal veges and oh so appetising. It was absolutely delicious! Sweet seafoody juices and plentiful orange aioli.

The pork belly was likewise satisfying. Crispy crackling and tender pork meat accompanied with perfectly seared large scallops. Little bits of cuttlefish and chorizo sat amongst the lemon emulsion. Dots of a pretty strong piquillo pepper coulis also added to the layers of flavour.

For the mains, hubby ordered a 'glacier 51' toothfish. We had never had toothfish before. Not only is this fish part of the sustainability hype, the texture and flavour of this fish makes me want to order it again and again. It's complex yet really delicate - the meat kind of flakes off. It's quite sweet and quite clean in flavour. It was served with a horseradish tortellini which really should not have made it on the plate. The tortellini was sub par - super thick almost rubbery shell with not much taste to it's innards. The tomato consomme was packed full of flavour and complemented the fish well.

I get sucked into all things squid ink. If squid ink is on the menu, I'm ordering it! This squid in fettuccine was pretty damn awesome! Cooked perfectly and tossed with tomato and chilli lobster oil. YUM! There were also lots of rather large chunks of lobster - but really, I just want more lobster oil :)

We were so full by the end of the mains but I really wanted something sweet to finish off the meal. It was hard to say no to the caramel-centred dark chocolate mousse with valrhona milk chocolate icecream. The feuilletine crumble was also excellent. It was gooey, not overly sweet, smooth but with crunchy bits. The only thing that didn't need to be there is the gold foil. When will we learn that we don't need to eat gold?

All up, it was a great experience. Really relaxing location with yummy food. It is a tad on the expensive side though (and really easy to be carried away with ordering just about everything on the menu).

Ratings:
Food - 9/10
Service - 7/10
Ambiance - 9.5/10
Value for money - 7/10
Overall - 32.5/40

Catalina
Lyne Park
Rose Bay
Tel: (02) 9371 0555

The Devonshire - Surry Hills

$35 for a three course meal at a hatted restaurant? I'm in!

The Devonshire does this pretty awesome deal every Friday lunch time. The menu changes from week to week - they post it up on their FB page most of the time. As amazing as it sounds, it's actually taken me a (long) while to get here - you know, with the whole working a full time job not in the city type deal... But I have to say, this place is so awesome that it might just be worth that day off work ;)

We walk into this intimate, classy little mirror-laden room to be served by two really friendly waiters. It's all a little Frenchie and a little bit posh. We a quickly given a little wooden slab with two types of butter - housemade honey butter and normal salted butter - cut perfectly I might add, and two piping hot, fresh out of the over baguettes which is just oh so heavenly (especially when the slightly sweetened honey butter melts all over the super soft hot bready innards)... I take such a liking to their honey butter that I am soon using the bread as an accompaniment to my butter, much to my hubby's amusement.

Our entree for this Friday was a smoked pork belly beignet. Perfectly crumbed and golden brown, full of flavour and just pull apart meat, all sitting happily on a pool of celeriac veloute. This celeriac veloute was mindblowingly good. So smooth, so rich, so creamy and oh so so soooooo good. Pickled fennel and apple added a good balance to the dish. And did I say that the veloute was mindblowingly good???

For the main, we had seared Barramundi with potato noodles and an orange, pine nut and chive salad. The fish was cooked perfectly - well seasoned and silky smooth. Hubby didn't like the potato noodles much... it was a bit fiddly in the mouth. But the side of potatoes that we ordered were pretty fantastic. Triple cooked for that extra crunch and with a rich garlicky aroma. YUM!

Dessert was a bittersweet chocolate mousse with a rum & raisin milk sorbet and chocolate biscuit crumble. The mousse was not the least bit sweet - perfect for dark chocolate lovers but a nightmare for sweet-tooths. However, it did combine well with the sweetness of the sorbet. The crumble also added good texture.

So for $35 (less if you have an Entertainment Book), this is probably the best value fine-dining quality lunch you can get. Pretty amazing stuff - I'd definitely be back for more!

Ratings:
Food - 8.5/10
Service - 7.5/10
Ambiance - 7/10
Value for money - 9/10
Overall - 32/40

The Devonshire 
204 Devonshire Street
Surry Hills
NSW 2010
Tel: (02) 9698 9427

Saint Crispin - Collingwood

I had complained (just a little) about how we hadn't eaten at a nice restaurant for a while. And so - my awesome hubby decides to spoil me with two hatted restaurants in one day.

For a late lunch, we headed to Collingwood on the outskirts of Melbourne CBD to Saint Crispin. As we had landed relatively late for lunch, only the two or three course menu was available (as opposed to the two degustation options). It took all my bargaining power to convince hubby that a two course meal was more than enough for lunch!

Treated first to their amuse bouches - a crispy rice cracker with seaweed salt flakes and a 'pressed melon'. The rice cracker was a tiny bit moist - not as crispy as I've had at other places before. The 'pressed' melon was a super dense melon ... I'm not too sure if I'm a fan. The bread, on the other hand, was amazing ESPECIALLY when had with their french onion cream cheese dallop. Super rich in oniony flavour, smooth and light. The butter was also not bad but nothing in comparison with the onion concoction.

bread and amuse bouche

For our first course, hubby opted for the quail. The quail was perfectly cooked, juicy and tender, and served with shaved cuttlefish, shiitake mushroom and kombu. The kombu broth was soooo rich and soooo tasty. The whole dish was a bit of a flavour explosion.

Quail with cuttlefish

I had chosen the Atlantic salmon. Small slices of sashimi style salmon was served with a smoked oyster puree sauce, pops of salmon roe, finger lime and sea vegetables. This was quite light and refreshing. A good start to my very short time in Melbourne.

Salmon with smoked oyster

Hubby chose the Cone Bay barramundi for his main. Crispy skinned, perfectly cooked barra was served with plentiful dallops of eggplant, tomato and sea urchin. Bits of kale and quinoa also made it to the plate. We both liked this healthy option.

Barramundi with eggplant and sea urchin

Mine was a Bannockburn chicken - both breast and thigh, both perfectly succulent and juicy. YUM. It came with tasty sweetcorn, spaetzle and basil. LOVED it! Really really tasty and really really well done.

chicken with sweet corn

 A sweet ending of raspberry marshmellows was provided. Not a huge fan of marshmellows normally, but these were pretty good - fluffy and not too sweet.

raspberry marshmellow

 I'm not used to having two course lunches. Looking over at hubby, I could tell that he didn't either. But the food was pretty delicious here. Service was slightly lacking... but we had an enjoyable enough experience.

Ratings:
Food - 8.5/10
Service - 6.5/10
Ambiance - 7.5/10
Value for money - 7.5/10
Overall - 30/40

Saint Crispin
300 Smith Street
Collingwood
VIC, 3066
Tel: (03) 9419 2202

Berowra Waters Inn - Berowra Waters

For my birthday this year, my hubby spoilt me with a meal at Berowra Waters Inn. It's a restaurant that I'd always wanted to go to - except that they closed down before I got to it. Imagine my surprise and excitement when it re-opened again shortly after! Located in a serene and tranquil 'middle of nowhere' place on the Hawkesbury, the restaurant is only accessible by boat or by the extravagant seaplane. On the upside, it meant that the view was spectacularly amazing!

For a Friday night, the restaurant was surprisingly not that full. We were served by two friendly and attentive waiters - one with an awesome Frenchie accent. The restaurant offers a degustation menu but was flexible enough to accommodate for my pickiness. As I'm not really into wines and hubby had to drive, neither of us opted for the matching wines.

Berowra Waters Inn

We were first served with an amuse bouche of an oyster wrapped in squid ink, oyster cream and cous cous. ZOMG seconds please! The oyster was really creamy and greatly complemented by the squidy inky taste. The oyster cream was also delicious - smooth and rich.

Oyster with Squid ink and oyster cream

We were offered a choice of white bread or white onion brioche. I favoured the white bread more. It came with a house made tomato butter and black olive crumbs. Surprisingly, I enjoyed this butter more than I thought.

white bread, white onion brioche with tomato butter and black olive

The first official course we had was the scallops with knäckebröd. It looked so pretty and as a bonus, the scallops were cooked perfectly. The knäckebröd provided that additional crunch and texture.

scallops and knäckebröd

The next course was one of my favourites. It was a confit ocean trout with smoke milk and dashi. The dashi came in the form of foam, as well as super delicious crackers. It was sooooo yummy! Tasty and delicate, all at the same time.

trout, smoked milk and dashi

The sole was the next course. The sole was a finger slice sitting a top of bits of carid prawn. The yellow orangey stuf on top was absolutely delcious... but I can't for the life of me remember what it was. The broccoli puree sauce was super delicious and bits of pine nuts added to the overall flavour of the dish.

sole, broccoli and carid prawn

Kale was a part of our next course. Having cooked kale chips at home and actually enjoyed it, I was happy to see it on the place. There was kale cooked several ways - baked (or fried?) thinly, wrapped around the duck mixture, as well as boiled and chopped and mixed with some other stuff (memory failing). The main star of the dish was the duck, again, cooked two ways. It was tender and tasty. There was also mustard and a cherry sauce on the plate.

duck, cherries and kale

Our last savoury course was the slow cooked beef short rib with onion. Could not fault the tenderness of the beef, covered in a herb concoction, and could not fault the creamy puree that it sat next to. Hubby loved it!

short rib and onions

The next course was the one that I needed the restaurant to change for me. It was goats cheese wrapped with beetroot, all sitting ontop of a licorice powder. All three ingredients I did not eat. But hubby happily enjoyed the dish.

goats cheese, beetroot and licorice

Instead, I got a caramelised pear with apple jelly and apple strips. It was sweet. Very very sweet. Not the type of sweet I like unfortunately.

caramelised pear with apple

I thoroughly enjoyed the palate cleanser - a shot of coconut cream with pineapple foam. Such an awesome combination! Loved it!

coconut cream with pineapple

The finale of the night suited my tastes muchly. It was a chocolate mousse cream cake with hazelnut icecream, chocolate bits and shavings, and apricot. Yum yum yum!

hazelnut, chocolate, apricot

I felt extremely satisfied by the end of the meal. It was really deliciousness. The service was great. View was amazing. Would definitely want to come here again so I hope it survives the years!!!

Ratings:
Food - 9/10
Service - 8/10
Ambiance - 8/10
Value for money - 7/10
Overall - 32/40

Berowra Waters Inn
Lot 22/ Warves
Berowra Waters
NSW 2082
Tel: (02) 9456 1027

Flying Fish - Pyrmont

For an extremely rare work training event, I was not only treated to FREE training, but also to an absolutely amazing three course meal at Flying Fish.

With bridge view on a gorgeous sunny day, we were given a choice of three entrees, three mains, and three desserts. However, as it was a work training thing, I could only take the photos of the dishes around me which were ordered by colleagues I knew.

The entree I chose was the Petuna ocean trout tartare This was AWESOME. Small fresh cubes of trout mixed in with bits of crunchy nori, ponzu, radish and scattered salmon roe. Every bite of this just danced in my mouth.

Ocean Trout Tartare

A couple of my friends had the Yellowfin Tuna. This was lightly seared slices drenched in a sweet soy ish caramelised ish sauce with crunchy puffed pork skin, grapefruit, black pepper caramel. I was lucky enough to sample a bit of it. It was pretty damn tasty!

Yellowfin Tuna

My manager at work is a vegetarian so he opted for the roasted beetroot. This looked like small ravioli of beetroot with a house made cashew cheese, raisin and mustard seed goop inside. No complaints from my manager.

roasted beetroot

In terms of the main, the only dish around me (and my dish) was the Barramundi. This fillet of fish was perfectly cooked. Crispy skinned and beautifully soft-textured fish meat. Spots of nori vinaigrette added flavour to the fish. The fish was accompanied by an eggplant stack with a miso paste sauce

Barramundi

The dessert did not disappoint. I had the coconut sorbet with young coconut marshmellow bits. The coconut sorbet was super super delicious. It sat on a sheep’s yoghurt which I didn't care too much for, but the eucalyptus caramel was something I loved and wish I got more of. There were also little discs of fresh mango and lime bits. Amazing!

Coconut sorbet

One of my friends had the dark and white chocolate ganache served with raspberries, mascarpone mousse, pistachio, balsamic, sour cherry sorbet. She adored this dessert - especially the 'popping candy' component which added to the fun of the day :)

black and white chocolate ganache

Coffee or tea, and a small macaron accompaniment was served to round off a great meal. I have to say, this restaurant definitely deserves it's hat. I think I'll have to come back and take my family here!

Ratings:
Food - 9/10
Service - 8/10
Ambiance - 8/10
Value for money - 8/10
Overall - 33/40

Flying Fish

19-21 Pirrama Road
Pyrmont
NSW 2009
Tel: (02) 9518 6677

Black by Ezard - Pyrmont

For hubby's birthday, we decided to test out some yummy steak at Black by Ezard at the Star. Stepping though really big and heavy automatic door brings you into a dimmed, very nicely and elegantly decorated area. The music choice, however, was interesting and not particularly to my taste.

To start, complementary brioche was given. The loaf was super flaky (like a croissant), really buttery and awesomely soft. I loved it! Hubby didn't. I think he likes your normal bread rolls. He found it too fluffy or airy.

freshly baked brioche

Entree-wise, shared some oysters and their famous organic farm egg ($25). The farm egg was poached and lived in a crispy noodle ball. It all sat on some really tasty potato cream and a light herb salad was atop it. On the side, there was a very thin but crazily delicious slice of iberico jamon. All up, it felt a lot like breakfast. I swear I would be over the moon getting this for a weekend brunch but as an entree, it was a little bit odd. Tasty but odd.

organic farm egg - $25

The oysters ($4 each) that we got were served with yuzu and wakame jelly. The jelly was a crazy flavour explosion - recommended to be eaten with the oyster and not on its own (trust me).

oysters with yuzu and wakame - $4 each

For the main, we really didn't know which steak to order. Hence, we decided to share the Wagyu Trio ($170). This was wagyu 9+ marble scored rumpcap, flat iron and striploin. Normally at Black, you tend to get a tiny tiny piece of steak on a massively otherwise empty white plate. So we got considerable more steak than the norm - and it proved to be almost impossible to finish (atleast for me). Every bite was absolutely deliciousness! The beef was really tasty and really tender, each bite was 'melt-in-your-mouth'. Superb - and I guess for that price, it had to be! We had our steak with the marrow and shallot sauce ($4) which was super tasty also.

Trio of Wagyu - $170 (to share)

marrow and shallot sauce - $4

For sides ($10 each), we had a gratin with leek, brioche, chives and gruyere cheese, and a potato puree. In retrospect, I definitely would not have ordered these two sides. WAAAYYY to rich and WAAAAYYYY to cheese and buttery. I love the potato puree though - was like eating pure buttery heaven, so I probably would have ditched the gratin in favour of some sort of salady green.

leek gratin - $!0

potato puree - $10

I really wanted dessert. The chocolatey peanuty ball was crazily tempting but my stomach just would not comply. I was completely fully stuffed and could not eat ANYTHING. So next time, I'd go for just a tiny steak with just one side and definitely try to leave room for dessert.

Ratings:
Food - 8.5/10
Service - 7.5/10
Ambiance - 7.5/10
Value for money - 7/10
Overall - 30.5/40

Black by Ezard
Level G, Harbourside, The Star
80 Pyrmont Street
Pyrmont NSW 2009
Tel: (02) 9657 9109

Sails - Lavender Bay

We had a wonderful dinner at Sails one night. Spectacular views of the harbour was ever present with massive ceiling to floors windows all round. We has just missed the sunset/golden hour but in the night, luna park was lit up, harbour bridge was more than visible, and the opera house was a nice blueness (for autism awareness month) making it breath-taking anyway.

We had decided against the degustation for this occasion. Instead,we had crystal bay prawns ($28) to share as an entree and a main each. To start the night, there was nicely warmed bread and an amuse bouche of arancini balls with parmesan and truffle. (Photos are really bad quality due to the mood lighting in the restaurant). The acancini balls were really flavoursome - crunchy golden outside, toast hot and creamy inside.

bread and butter

truffle and parmesan arancini balls

Our entree was nicely split into two plates for us. The prawns were de-shelled and butterflied and went hand in hand with sweet corn puree. There was a nicely crispy thin slice of pancetta , a crab and shallot pastille and some popcorn scattered. The popcorn was a bit unnecessary but everything else was delicious~

crystal bay prawns

For mains, I had the poached ora king salmon ($38). This was a big slab of medium rare cooked salmon which was super soft, fell off the spoon, and melt-in-your-mouth. It was deliciousness! It came on a bed of greens - I think it was spinach - cylinders of saffron potato, small calamari rings and a tasty salmon broth.

poached salmon

Hubby had a main of rib-eye on the bone. It was a massive chunk of steak cooked perfectly medium-rare and it came with a side of super yummy crispy hand-cut chips. The chips were amazing!!! Super crunchy an super fluffy! Some of the best chips I've had! The steak was also one of the best steaks we've had for a while.

rib eye on the bone

hand cut chips

On the side, we had a salad of cos and trevisio with avocado, baby capers and croutons ($12). The salad was alright - added some balance to our protein-loaded meals.

cos and trevisio salad

I eyed the dessert menu and contemplated for heaps long - but at the end, there was nothing I really wanted. So, we skipped it.

All in all, it was a lovely meal. The food was deliciousness and the view, breath-taking. Will definitely be back!

Ratings:
Food - 8.5/10
Service - 7/10
Ambiance - 8.5/10
Value for money - 7/10
Overall - 31/40

Sails at Lavender Bay
2 Henry Lawson Ave
McMahons Point
NSW 2060
Tel:(02) 9955 5998