Bishop Sessa - Surry Hills

For hubby's 30th we went to Bishop Sessa - a cosy French restaurant in Surry Hills. Having seen lots of yummy photos on Instagram, I was really quite excited. Luckily, their delicious-sounding degustation menu did not disappoint.

The amuse bouche set a good precedent for the night. I don't remember exactly what it was, just that it was heaps tasty. The cracker was crispy and light, and the sprinklings of seaweed powder on it was awesome! The cream was tasty too... just don't remember what was in the cream... 

 Unfortunately, course 1 did not appeal to my palate as much as the amuse bouche. There was a wobbly mussel creme caramel with calamari, small grapefruit bits and this green slightly bitter fennel sauce. I didn't really get it. It was all a bit sloppy. The creme caramel's flavour was really subtle and and when combined with the green dallop, it was just a bit weird. Guess its frenchie though.

 The second course was heaps yummier. Thin scallop pieces lay under avocado mousse, cucumber and carrot thins, and a lemon & ginger beer sorbet. This worked. The sorbet was really refreshing and went well with the scallop ceviche. The thin rice cracker was also a good addition.

The miso glazed Melanda Park pork came next and was super melt-in-your-mouth. It was super tasty with tons of flavour. There were also these little cubes of deep fried pork fat which just disintegrated once bitten. It was pretty amazing! Definitely not for the faint hearted though. The pork was served with celeriac puree, pickled enoki, and some greens.

The confit duck tortellini was well received by hubby. I agreed that the duck meat was cooked well - really soft and tender. However, the seasoning was a bit heavy. I found it really quite salty. I also felt that the pasta was a bit too thick. The tortellini came with baby carrots, walnuts and a citrus sauce.

The last meat dish was potato wrapped red wine braised organic wagyu. This was like a high-class sausage roll. The potato pastry was super crispy and crunchy and the beef cubes were tender and with good seasoning in the sauce. I loved the cauliflower puree and the wilted silverbeet. A bone marrow sauce finished the dish off.

I also loved the pre-dessert. It was a refreshing sorbet of some sort... parsnip? (I don't remember ... >.<) But it was really good and really delicious!

The actual dessert was the chocolate nemesis. Super rich chocolate ganache was served with slow roasted pear puree, brioche and a yummy ginger icecream.

All up, I think that it was a pretty good meal. The food was tasty and plentiful - definitely value for money. Service was attentive enough.

Ratings:
Food - 8/10
Service - 7/10
Ambiance - 7/10
Value for money - 8/10
Overall - 30/40

Bishop Sessa
527 Crown Street
Surry Hills
NSW 2010
Tel: (02) 8065 7223

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

Amber - Hong Kong

We had wanted to squeeze in something fun in amongst a super quick and slightly stressful trip to HK. So, ahead of time, we had booked in Amber, a 2 Michelin star restaurant, for lunch. To book this restaurant, we had to lock in a deposit of over HK$500 per person. Normally, this would be non-issue. Unfortunately, in the super early hours of the day we were meant to be going to Amber for lunch, I came down with food poisoning and was spewing left right and centre - leaving me with zero appetite. Hence, the conundrum began... do we not go and loose HK$1000? or do we go anyway despite me not able to eat?

Being ultimate foodies, I put on a brave face and went anyway. Hubby also promised to eat my meal. We were seated promptly at 12.30pm in a beautifully yet simply adorned room. The tables were nicely spaced out so no one got in anyone's way. We ordered a set lunch each and were provided with three seemingly awesome amuse bouches and really well done bread. We both had the french baguette and they were so good! Crispy and warm, yet white and fluffy inside. Awesome~

There was the mini crab salad spring roll, a beetroot and foie gras lollipop, and a cream curry croquette. I believe that all three were deliciousness (according to hubby) and if I didn't think I'll be spending hours over a toilet bowl, I think I would have loved it too. As it stands, I just nibbled on all. The foie gras lollipop was beautifully rich and smooth and full of flavour. The croquette I think was made to eat in one bite, as when you bite on it, a wonderful creamy curry mix flows out. The spring rolls were delicate yet flavoursome.

 

 

In terms of our entrees, hubby had the Hokkaido sea urchin. This was a small sea-urchin shaped shell with fresh sea urchin, a lobster jelly, cauliflower mousse, a ton of caviar and gold leaf. This was served with an assortment of seaweed crisps. It looked so delicate and I so wished I wasn't sick as I only managed to eat a small spoon of this. The flavours were wonderful and subtly sweet. The textures so wonderfully smooth and the seaweed crisps? Deliciousness!

The second entree was the cep mushrooms. This was a thin puree film of kabocha (Jap pumpkin) with scattered mushrooms, fresh hazelnuts, bellota ham and bits of lettuce. It was OK. Didn't taste particularly awesome or flavourful. Didn't feel like a waste that I couldn't eat it. Instead, I wanted or rather, NEEDED an iced lemon tea - it was the freaking best iced lemon tea I've had... probably cos that was the only thing my stomach wanted at that time.

The two mains we ordered was the fish and the pork. The Atlantic cod was a pretty hefty piece of fish. It was cooked confit and was absolutely perfect. Unfortunately, it lacked any form of flavour. A bit of salt would be good no? The fish was served on a bed of paimpol coco beans and chorizo... again, slightly devoid of any taste. It came with three black squid ink fish balls which tasted almost nothing of fish balls.

The pork had a bit more flavour. Unfortunately, these cubes of piglet shoulder lacked the crispy skin that it should have offered. It came with sweet potato, cepes (mushies) and tat soi (spinachy things). It was dressed with a rich pork emulsion.

The pre-dessert was pretty much the first thing I really ate. I couldn't resist. It was a tiny magnum looking pop. Coconut sorbet covered with chocolate and nuts. AMAZING. I gobbled it all up.

 This was the start of my appetite as I could also stomach the dessert. It looked amazing and there were the flavours to back it up. The triangular Jivara chocolate cremeux with a rich perfect-looking cocoa glaze was served with coconut sorbet and a white chocolate disk. Really chocolately. Really rich. Creamy, yet with a crispy crunchy bottom. Delicious! I was surprised that I could eat most of this! (and I kept it down~ chocolate really does heal all).

Hubby had the cheese. Whilst the cheese cart offered much yummy delicacies, we left it up to our waiter to decide our selection (we weren't familiar with most of the cheesey names). He gave us a really good selection... some cheese yummier than others. Hubby particularly liked the blue cheese option.

Coffee and tea are complimentary here and so, hubby had a coffee whilst I had another lemon tea to go with our tower of petit fours. There was a fruity caramel lolly, a lemony creme thing, chocolate tart, mini macaron, a coffee profiterole, and an almond biscuit thing. I think it was more the WOW factor. Definitely wowed me. But I guess taste-wise, it was just average.

So all up, it was a decent meal at Amber. The sea urchin and the jivara chocolate dessert was probably the highlight of the meal. Everything else was just average. 2 Star worth? not super sure about that...

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

Amber Restaurant
7/F, The Landmark Mandarin Oriental
15 Queens Road Central
Central Hong Kong
Tel: +852 2132 0066

Guillaume at Bennelong - Circular Quay

We had heard the news that Guillaume at Bennelong is closing. As I'd never been there, I wasn't too devastated about it. But then hubby heard from friends that it's a top-notch restaurants and as such, he couldn't resist but to book it in.

Bennelong Restaurant

From all the word-of-mouth reviews from our friends, our expectations of this place was rather high. On this occasion, we opted for the 4 course a-la-carte menu ($150). The menu was briefly explained but the same waiter for each table and promptly after the explanation, he dashed off - to return a very very very long time later. It seems that the most attentive staff at the restaurant was our sommelier who chose us a very nice bottle of white.

The sourdough and the creamy butter was quite deliciousness. The bread was soft and tasty, and the crust crunchy. Unfortunately, when we wanted a bit more bread halfway through the meal, we had to ask THREE times for it (as it was delivered to the wrong table first, then the request was ignored).

sourdough and butter

The amuse bouche was another place where the waiter screwed up. They delivered it the next table, which then clashed with the delivery of their first course. The amuse bouche, when it did get here, was really delicious. Velvety pumpkin puree with that seared foie gras cube to make it super creamy and crazily tasty. Yup! sign me up for more of this.

pumpkin veloute

Hubby's choice of first course was the smoked eel with silverbeet, oyster, truffle and 'Sot L'y Laisse'.
It was heaps aromatic and the presentation was interesting. Hubby found it 'okay' in taste.

smoked eel

I opted for the savoury green custardwhich was the pea royale. The cold, smooth custard was really rich and full of flavour. It was topped with cubes of speck, croutons and peas, with truffle specks throughout. Tasty.

pea royale

For the second course, hubby ordered the squid 'tagliatelle'. The sea urchin butter sauce smelt really really good! The squid was thinly sliced to mimic tagliatelle and was served with a squid ink tapioca cracker.

Squid Tagliatelle

My choice was the scallops, seared to perfection. It came with jerusalem artichoke, broad beans and chicken jus gras. I love well cooked, tasty scallops :)

scallops

I think that's where the awesomeness stops. Hubby's main was the wagyu beef. The waiter had said that it was the brisket slow cooked for 12 hours. It's meant to be melt-in-your-mouth, but it wasn't. I think it was still quite chewy and stringy. The wagyu came with shimeji mushrooms, a potato galette, parsley puree dollop, and a parsnip puree dollop. The waitress also came out with their 'famous' paris mash. This was good. Creamy, buttery and smooth. Unfortunately, compared to some potato purees we have had recently (e.g. at Black by Ezard), it fell short.

wagyu beef brisket

My deconstructed bouillabaisse was better. The clear soup was full of flavour. Unfortunately, the barramundi and the prawn were both a touch overcooked. They gave me mash with this too! LOL. Also, complimentary salad was also given on the side.

barramundi and prawns

A palate cleanser of pink grapefruit and champagne granita was not really my cup of tea nor to my hubby's liking. It was slightly too bitter and a bit too strong on the champagne hit.

pink grapefruit granita

The dessert was pretty good though. Hubby had the nougat glace. There was a ring of caramelised banana on top of the nougat and served with a caramelly icecream with crushed peanuts.

nougat glace

I had the chestnuty mouse encased in a chocolate tube. The dots of quince (?) and pear however, was left untouched on my plate. The chestnut icecream was also pretty decent.

Chestnut cassis

Petit fours were served with coffee. There was green tea macarons, jelly dome, caramel, madeline and chocolate truffle. Not too bad. My favourite was the caramel, then the macaron.

petit fours

So all up, there were some hits and some misses. The miss was probably the slow and inattentive service which was witnessed until the final stages of the meal where even our bill was wrong. For the price, I daresay it could have been a bit better. If you had wanted to try this place out for yourself, be quick - as it's closing at the end of the year.

Ratings:
Food - 7.5/10
Service - 4/10
Ambiance - 8/10
Value for money - 7/10
Overall - 26.5/40

Guillaume at Bennelong
Sydney Opera House
Bennelong Point
Sydney NSW 2000
Tel: (02)  9241 1999

Vue de Monde (2) - Melbourne

Our previous visit to Vue de Monde had been mind-blowingly awesome. As such, when we were organising a last minute trip to Melbourne, we decided to see whether or not they had a dinner reservation available and to our luck, we were offered a 8.30pm seating on a Monday night.

Our expectations for this dinner were high (due to our great experience last time). And despite being 8.30pm, hubby still opted to do the 10 course degustation. We were greeted warmly by our waiter who asked about our food preferences (of which there are various things I do not eat), and they tailored our amuse bouche and our degustation accordingly.

sticks and stones

Again, being playful with rocks and logs, our amuse bouches comprised of several things. We got chips again, which was much to our delight. It came with an awesome creamy and tasty macadamia dip. As I don't eat wallaby, a lone slice of wallaby meat was rolled on a salt block before carefully placed on the rock. Hubby said that it was tasty but in the chewy, textured kind of way. I got a herb gel in place of the wallaby which was tasty enough. The carrot with mussels and brown butter cream was deceivingly simple looking but amazing! Loads of flavours came in all at once with the humble carrot stick. Likewise, the marshmallow sprinkled with truffle and nuts was delicious! Sweet and savoury and chewy and soft and crunchy all at the same time. The smoked eel was a bit of dubious one... toffee-like substance coated the eel (most probably the white chocolate), then topped with caviar. It was really sweet, and the toffee got stuck to our teeth. 

chips with macadamia nut cream

salt cured wallaby

carrot with brown butter

truffled marshmellow

herbed gel

white chocolate eel

Amuse bouches over, our first course was the trout - or at least their play on a trout sandwich. Dehydrated powdered trout with breadcrumbs, egg cream and, fish roe and snowy wasabi - all plated nicely and all  played their different roles in offering the range of taste, flavours and textures. The powdery trout carried intense flavours and when eaten with the icy wasabi - it was YUM.

trout sandwich

You could smell our next course from a mile away. The Melbourne onion soup was boiled and scientifically dealt with a the table. Supposedly, the soup enters the top bulb, soaks in some more smoky and oniony flavours, before the flame goes off and the soup goes back down. Really though, the waiter admitted that it was just for the theatrical WOW value :P. It was sooooo intensely sweet and oniony.  with the intense broth was onions done a few different ways. Hubby loved it. I loved it too, initially anyway, until it just got a little too much.

melbourne onion soup

The next course was one of my favourites. It was simple looking but amazing! The marron was cooked perfectly - juicy and sweet, and when combined with the brown butter and pork floss?!?! Flavour explosion and then some. I could just lick up that brown butter and pork floss creamy combination.

marron with brown butter and pork floss

The bread basket again came with warming stones. The bread was crunchy on the outside and fluffy whiteness on the inside and was quite delectable when eaten with the creamy french butter.

bread with warming stones

delicious creamy butter

There was then a great big runny duck yolk with green beans, powdered peas, crunchy Parmesan crisps, apple discs and mint. The yolk broke into a nice gooey runniness.

duck yolk with pea, mint and apple

runny yolk :)

The palate cleanser was the same as last time - simple refreshing flavours of cucumber and pineapple sage with the theatrics of liquid nitrogen and the fun-ness of us crushing it all up. A good show, good fun and good taste all wrapped up in a simple package :)

palate cleanser

The barramundi and banana prawn was also mindblowingly awesome. Both seafoods were cooked perfectly. bits of foam here and there and a perfectly rolled slice of potato. There was a subtle hint of garlic flavour and I LOVED the purple cauliflower. who would have guessed that such powerful tastes can come in such small packages. this came with a super crunchy deep fried prawn legs with an intensely delicious and smooth brown butter blob. The dish was amazingness!

barramundi and prawn

deep fried prawn legs with brown butter

I don't eat lamb either and so, whilst hubby got a lamb dish, I received a fish course. Hubby's lamb was from Flinder's Island. There were two different bits of the lamb - one was supposedly yum and the other, also yum but crazily 'lamby' (ie. full of lamb/game meat flavour). My Striped Trumpeter was also good. It came with leek, oyster, kale and tarragon.

Flinders Island Lamb

Striped Trumpeter

The next course was also cooked at the table. With the portable barbeque brought over, I know that it was meant to be a piece of kangaroo meat, but due to the fact I also don't eat kangaroo, this became wagyu beef for us. The wagyu was accompanied with beetroot, saltbush, their house-made BBQ sauce (that thick yellowy paste that looks nothing like BBQ sauce) and truffle.

Wagyu Beef

We were a bit greedy and wanted the cheese course too (even though we were full). The cheese cart was rolled over and I opted for all cows milk cheeses whereas hubby went adventurous and got all goats/sheeps/ewe milk cheeses. I preferred mine. It came with yummy breads, condiments and delicious fresh honeycomb.

Cheese Cart

bread and condiments

assortment of cheeses

We received a spiced tea with a frozen milk blob before our official desserts arrived. I'm not a fan of cinnamon and this was very cinnamony (or some sort of spice that I disliked).

spiced tea

Dessert time came and it was close to midnight. I think that the staff were possibly feeling tired and fatigued by now. The first dessert was the while chocolate ganache swirl with rhubarb, ground chocolate and coffee iceream. The white chocolate swirl was really rich and creamy. The coffee icecream was also quite yum. There were little chocolate crunchy balls to add the texture :)

white chocolate ganache with rhubarb and coffee icecream

The last course of the night was the chocolate souffle with chocolate mouse and creme anglaise truffle. I think that as far as souffles go, it was not a bad one. Just that I'm not a super fan of souffles... Hubby liked it though! :)

chocolate souffle

Lastly, petit-fours and coffee. There was this ice cherry thing which was intensely frozen - like a frozen pop that doesn't really melt, lamington-looking cubes with really really smooth chocolate mousse innards and a drop of concentrated raspberry sauce, these 'one penny' copper looking coins which was actually really soft and gelatinous, and my favourite of the lot - the chocolate clam shells with olive oil. Amazingly sweet and savoury - much like a lightly salted chocolate.

By the end of the meal, it was past 12.30am. We received a doggy bag filled with next day's breakfast (a loaf of brioche, muesli, tea, cookies, honey) and were personally walked downstairs. 

Was it a great meal? Yes!

Would we return? Yes! But probably not any time too soon. It is quite costly afterall :)

Ratings:

Food - 9.5/10

Service - 9.5/10

Ambiance - 9.5/10

Value for money - 8.5/10

Overall - 36.5/40

Vue de Monde
Level 55, Rialto Building
525 Collins Street
Melbourne, VIC 3000
Tel: (03) 9691 3888