Unfortunately they tended to get a little frenzied around the sushi bar!
(Just back from our 4 night Liveaboard dive cruise to the Coral Sea and Great Barrier Reef - 10 dives in 3.5 days - we had a great time! Back in Sydney now - pooped out!)
Here are the waterfall shots......
We loved our fully equipped little cottage and the local produce was excellent, so we cooked at home alot. Notably the town restaurants and cafes do wonderful breakfasts, but we never take pictures before 11am. We did go to two very satisfying restaurants - Buffs seems to be a town institution and with a young chef and very attentive serving staff is creating some wonderful local cuisine.
- large ravioli in a fragrant fresh tomato/herb relish
- black mussels steamed in aromatic broth
- prawns with Thai sauce
Then a food we're eating more and enjoying more - calamari. Not sure how they do it, but the calamari here is tender and buttery. It's generally closely slit through halfway and we've heard tales of carbonate soaks, vinegar/lemon juice soaks, pounding and - of course - the "he puts it in the washing machine" story regularly appears. All the chefs we spoke to assured us this was untrue.....you only put Octopus in the washing machine
Of course the foundation of a memorable meal is often one memorable dish.....in this case a perfect piece of roast pork. As you know, we are old style pork fans and this was as old style as it gets - juicy, fat marbled, flavourful flesh. Totally unlike the organic styrofoam that passes as pork in North America. Plus the crackle was crispy, not chewy - a wonderful dish
Then off to Chris's - without the Ruth's. Chris is Greek, charming and serves great food.
The view from the restaurant (above) was spectacular, as was the food.
We opened with Chicken Liver Parfait, oxtail en gelee and duck raillettes - a definite triple success; plus chargrilled calamari steaks on fennel and mushroom risotto - again the calamari was butter tender
For mains, Richard has filet of Blue Eye on creamed potatoes with roasted pepper, capers and olive salsa. Pleasant, but too conservative a selection
Liz's choice was a triumph - Kakauia. Fish and shellfish in vegetable and garlic cream broth. Big flavours. Sopped up every drop with break and Richard poured it over his fish. Great dish!
Wonderful view, warm service, flavourful food - it doesn't get any better!
Tasmania - for us - was love at first sight. It's calm, relaxed, physically beautiful, the people are friendly, the weather is mellow and the wild life is delightful. Actually, the last comment is a lie. Most of the wildlife (birds, kangaroos, wallabies, wombats, possums, etc) are delightful ......but the eponymous Tasmanian Devil is anything but!
Warner Brothers' version is far too gentle. The living Taz is a hissing, snarling, snapping, biting ball of unpleasantness. We didn't see them in the wild, but did spend some time watching them in large enclosures. Two Devils can be snapping at opposite ends of the pen. Suddenly, one wakes and hustles down to attack his friend. No reason, no provocation, it just seemed like a good idea. They should have evolved in the Middle East.
Our shots are not heavily edited - they seem to spend most waking hours attacking each other. Note the red ears - apparently some form of heat control mechanism with blood close to the surface and directionally variable to the sun/wind
Despite their social misanthropy, Devils are perversely interesting - a feeling heightened by their potential extinction. For reasons unknown, they have generated a genetic, contagious facial cancer that is rapidly killing them. No cure is known. Attempts to breed geographically and genetically isolated lines are underway. A provoking sidebar - no one is sure if the phenomena could be transmitted to humans....if we have to go "Devil Flu" seems far more elegant than "Bird Flu".
Of course, the rest of Tasmania is one big adult petting zoo and Liz luxuriates in it. when you regularly see and hand feed kangaroos and wallabies, their frequent road kill deaths become just the more tragic. Following are some shots from various places of Liz and her friends - some alpha males, some lonely outsiders - she loved them all.
The foregoing shot is symbolic as it occurred while we were hiking up a mountain with a lot of other people around. The Roo comes out of the bush, obviously seeking to mooch some food. Liz and Dick are bouncing up and down - "Here's a live, wild Kangaroo!!!" Everyone else is looking at us like the Einsteins who found a live, wild gray squirrel in High Park. We still have lots to learn but you have to admit that a kangaroo is neater than a grey squirrel - sorta.
Here's more Roos and Wallabies including our reclusive Wally the Lonely Wallaby; the testicularily endowed Alpha Male and various mothers with pouched infants that must have freaked out the first European discoverers
As always in Australasia, the birds seduced us. when parrots are thousands of dollars each in a Canadian pet store, it's strange to sit and watch 50 of them feeding in your backyard. We have few great wild shots. They play high in the trees and move constantly. The following are caged in a reserve. We did have much fun with them - they are smart and have learned how to con visitors - the white one below constantly called "Hello" and consequently got most of the shortbread cookies we weren't supposed to have
One of our favourite is the Kookaburras who would perch in the Eucalyptus behind our house and emit their incredible call.....a distillation of every jungle sound from the first Tarzan black and white to the wonders of Jurrassic Park - they are sublime
Our posts are hopelessly out of whack - haven't finished writing Tasmania but have a few Sydney posts done.....so.....here we go - mainly food!
Drove from our Tasmanian country cottage to Hobart Airport at 5am. It was an interesting trek - very twisty mountain roads, tandem log trucks moving through the passes at 100Km, frequent fog patches and the occasional kangaroo wandering home late from the pub.....and in Tasmania it's very dark at 5am. We made it unscathed. Pleasant flight to Sydney and now ensconced in a marvelous all-suites hotel that Liz found us near the Harbour District - large living/dining room, fully equipped kitchenette, balcony, AC, comfy bed and high speed internet - so we'll try to catch up before we're off on our Scuba Diving cruise.
At first glance it seems Sydney has done infinitely more with its waterfront location than Toronto has ever dreamed about. Acres of parkland, fountains, playgrounds, an aquarium, museums, the Opera House and a restaurant row ranging from fast food to high end......and how do they solve the problem of essential elevated highways? (AKA - the Gardiner) - they just build the park under them and enjoy the shade - trees and all
We walk for an hour - heat and humidity are brutal.....and this is Fall! Before Richard melts we take shelter in a restaurant at the end of a renovated dock - Flying Fish.
The view of the Harbour Bridge and Harbour are postcards - as always we love the new Australian architecture across the channel - and we come across one of our favourite birds - a pair of Ibis seem to have morphed from the hieroglyphics on a Pharoh's tomb
Our waitress is wonderful - knowledgeable, fun and charming - a Minnie Driver look alike and sound alike. It is a memorable meal enhanced with some lovely wines.
For starters we share two entrees - 3 Seafood Tapas (very lovely to look at, pleasant to eat, but not sensational) and a provocative dish - lightly seared tuna with pork/pork crackling and pink grapefruit. Bizarre combination and it works. Who would have guessed that tuna and pork are complimentary?
And then, the best crab we've had since Tofino - 3.5 pounds of crustacean. They serve it in Oriental sauce, salt and pepper crust or salt and pepper and curry crust. Our waitress recommended the latter and we comply.......but what is crusty crab? (Other than the place where the cognescenti know that SpongeBob works)
Simply described it is a very large crab; briefly steamed, cleaned, separated, covered with a very spicy batter and then deep fried. It is a flavour triumph!
We root around in our crab bowls like happy porkers. The napkins, bibs and table cloth will never be used again. We order more wine and have even more fun. Side orders of grapefruit relish (succulent), monster chips (really good after we get a further side of aioli) and salad (we are way behind on vegetables at this stage).
While all this gustatory over indulgence is unfolding, Sydney is putting on another display apparently just for our amusement. First, Tubby the Tug Boat appears - 50 feet from our table
Then, it seems Tubby is towing something.......note the towline
Then it is quickly revealed that Tubby is towing a Car Freighter that is much larger than the restaurant we're in and very, very close to said same restaurant. Our respect for Tubby increases by orders of magnitude
We then watch while Tubby, other tugboats and the huge car freighter perform a water ballet as the freighter is moved to a new dock
As we wander home we pass a number of very heavy duty racing sloops that our sailing friends would enjoy
All in all a good start to our time in Sydney - and liz has obtained reservations at Tetsuya - the Visa card is at risk. We're in Dining Mode!!
Tetsuya's - rated #5 in the world. We beg. We whimper......actually Liz just hits it right and she phones moments after a cancellation. We're on for lunch.
Our hotel is, of course, within walking distance (Liz does plan ahead). The entry is delightfully pretentious. An electronic gate slides open a Mercedes width at our approach....we're the first foot traffic they've had in a decade! Inside, lovely art, design minimalism, a sparse room serviced by a warm, skilled and knowledgeable staff.
We start by suggesting that since the prix fixe 9 course menu contains 3 dessert courses and we don't eat sweets, perhaps we could substitute 2 savouries for 2 sweet courses. Not an eyelash is batted. We're off and running and clearly going to have a very good time.
We know nothing about Australian wine. Our Room Captain has us pegged and a bottle of suitably priced, suitably oaky chardonnay appears on the table with no foolish negotiations. Then a cavalcade of wonderful food.
An ameuse guele of Sweet Corn Soup with Basil Ice Cream. Wonderfully rich flavours, perfect texture (a nod to Ferran Adria in the counterpoint of temperatures) and Liz - the basil maven - is enchanted.
Then a tartare of Tuna on sushi rice with avocado and caviar. The tuna tartare is wonderful - subtley flavoured and at just the right temperature. While other restaurants focus justifiably on "doneness" Tetsuya's is very concerned with serving temperature. Plates are appropriately hot, warm, room temperature or chilled. Best of all is the avocado puree. As you've probably gathered we're going to replace our large indoor palm with an avocado tree! Fresh avocados are like fresh asparagus versus tinned....and when laced with caviar they are lethally good
Then three seafood tapas. Beautifully constructed edible works of art - tuna marinated in soy and mirin; smoked ocean trout with asparagus and washed onions (washed onions were a whole new culinary concept for us) and marinated NZ scampi with a succulent chicken parfait. A visual tour de force .... but we were overwhelmed with the subtlety of the chicken parfait
Then one of Tetsuya's signature dishes - confit of ocean trout with kelp crust on a bed of daikon and fennel. How do we describe this dish? If you take a filet of salmon and cook it without actually cooking it and reduce the whole thing to the consistency of butter and then coat it in savoury, crisp seaweed, you might come close. The recipe is in his cookbook - we read it at the table. We are literally eating the dish as Liz figures out how to cook it at home. Staff are amused - we're in heaven.....oh yes, there's a lovely salad served with the dish. A shock to our systems that have forgotten the concept of vegetables.
Tough to follow the previous act, but a lovely ravioli of crab on a bed of nori wrapped crab, dressed in basil and tomato vinaigrette keeps the flavour momentum rolling. Again we are enchanted with the temperatures.....just luke warm, flavours are not subdued by heat and subtleties emerge. You might pop a hot ravioli into your mouth and swallow - this one demands examination and appreciation
When we arrived our charming waitperson asked if we had any food allergies for the prix fixe menu - we advised her that since it contained no lobster or sweetbreads we were likely to die at the table. Not missing a beat she advised that the sweetbreads were available but if the lobster addiction was real - prepare to meet your maker!
The sweetbreads arrive on a platform of prawns with vinaigrette. Besgt sweetbreads we've had since Freddy Girardet closed in Crissier. Crisp outside, moist, subtle inside. Shrimp are fine but sweetbreads star
Next is a braised (barely) duck breast with orange jus on belgian endive. Every kitchen does duck breast. Some well, some badly - Tetsuya's does duck very well. We're now into a delightfully light but flavourful bottle of pinot and all is right with the world.
The next dish is a loin of NZ venison with capers and parsley. It's wonderfully prepared but as always we find that fish/fowl let a kitchen really stride. Meat is good, but inherently it comes back to the male "I coulda done this on the BBQ at home". Lovely venison, but not in the same league with the confit of ocean trout. Make no mistake, though, this is the best venison we've had in a long time
Then a revelatory dish - filet of veal with wasabi butter. Ignore everything we said above. This is wonderful! Of course wasabi goes with red meat.....it's horseradish. All Beeby roast beef dinners in future will include wasabi butter. Long discussions with staff on how to buy wasabi, culminating in commercial size bladder packs on the table - much fun, much learning. Great staff.
We finally succumb to protocol and have dessert - a floating island with praline and vanilla bean anglaise.....their descriptions - i's a wonderful cross between a custard and souffle, covered in delicious sauce, floating on delicious sauce and almost good enough to convert us back to the sweet side - not the chocolate and fruit buried inside
Overall a wonderful meal. Fun is had. Appetites are satisfed. Taste buds are provoked. Egos are stroked. Expectations are met.....it is everything fine dining should be. Inexpensive - no! Good value - yes!
We read reviews that decry Tetsuya's prices. Considering the bills for fish and chips at a roadside bar in Australia, 9 courses of delectable cuisine seems to be good value. Plus the staff has none of the snobbishness that happens in NYC or Paris on a bad day.
Definitely a restaurant that ranks up there with the French and Italian 3 stars, El Bulli, Jeans Georges, Charlie Trotter and Thomas Keller.
Walking back from Tetsuya's we encounter one of those signs we love......what are Euro-American Aromas and what happens if an Under 18 is exposed to them?
By the time we're home it is pouring - much to the delight of drought seared Sydney
The next day, our digestive juices primed by the Tetsuya experience, we head for Golden Century. Cab drivers, guide books, hotel concierges; all say it is the best Chinese Seafood in Sydney. One wall of the dining room is 24 tanks of crabs (multiple types and ranging close to 2 feet across), huge lobsters, live abalone, clams, shrimps and a variety of fish
We start with Hot and Sour Soup. Always amazed how much we enjoy this dish and this one is sufficiently flavourful to bring tears to our eyes
Then a plate of Pippi clams with XXX Hot Sauce. The clams were chewy (underdone, Liz thinks) but the sauce was devine. We save the sauce to pour on an order of fried rice
Then crab with green vegetables and wonderful deep fried garlic shrimp. The shrimps look as appetizing as styrofoam, but pack a wonderful combination of crispness and potent flavour. We eat until it starts getting silly and take the rest home to our hotel
We are loving Sydney a lot - especially the food!
Lunch at Quay:
We arrive back in Sydney after 4 days of diving the Great Barrier Reef . Wonderfully exhausted, hurt everywhere and are nearly deaf. We're two doddering retirement home inmates, cupping our ears to hear, while we hobble down the street in search of nourishment. But we're thrilled to be back in a favourite suites hotel in a city we are loving more and more. We'll inevitably return some year, rent a house and settile in for a few months. But now appetites must be satisfied. Off to "Quay", a highly recommended bistro overlooking the harbour.
We walk up from our hotel along Sydney's Bloor Street. The stroll by the harbour reminds us bitterly how Toronto has squandered its lakeside to development while Sydney has opened the city to the sea. Following pics are not beautiful, but give you some sense of the tasteful seafront access that Sydney offers everyone....not just condo dwellers ....and note that they accommodate trains, elevated roads, ground level roads, have lots of parks and not too much really bad art
The view from our table at Quay is a postcard quality shot of the Harbour, Bridge and Opera House. Ferries, water taxis and cruise ships bustle by in an ever entertaining water ballet.....synchronized swimming without the bathing caps.
We choose the 3 course menu, but negotiate a trade for an additional savoury starter in place of dessert - we just do not do sweets well.
Our knowledgeable waitperson delivers an excellent chardonnay and we're off and running.
The amuse geule was a shot glass of cauliflower zablione (sp?), topped with diced smoked salmon and seafood gelee. An unexpected pairing but an appropriately provocative opener. A definite promise of good things to follow.
We both chose "Sea Pearls" - 3 mouthful sized taste treats. From the left - abalone in seafood aspic, smoked branade in egg pearls (how they make the egg white pearls remains a mystery) and a succulent marinated tuna sashimi sphere.
Primed for the taste hunt, we move on to slow cooked quail breasts, baby radishes, spring onions, a truffle custard and baked milk skin
On to "Mud Crab Congee" - Liz's favourite crustacean. As Liz describes it - a broth of really loose risotto with succulent crab and a savoury creme brulee topping (but not terribly photogenic!)
On to the mains - Crisp Skin Murray Cod, braised oysters, lettuce puree, baby leeks and shaved cuttlefish. Too many ingredients? We think not. If chefs are also philosophers, then Peter Gilmore states his credo clearly with this dish. "Crisp" skin means "really crisp" - like potato chips - not chewy but truly crisp. Fish is cooked to arrive at the table in a state of perfection - meltingly firm....tasting of the sea. Oysters taste like oysters - not dried prunes and the lettuce puree is a distillation of lettuce-ness. All flavours retain their individuality while synthesizing to deliver a combined palate experience. A very good dish with the flexibility to mutate depending on ingredient availability - it is cuisine, not a recipe
Liz closed with a Crisp Confit of pressed Duck, white turnips, sea scallops and chive flowers.
Now we both love confit - we make it at home and Liz regards confit as the next best thing to Miss Vickie's potato chips. But this was confit unlike anything we had experienced. Physically unattractive, with a different flavour and texture profile, we of course asked and were advised that the chef ....
1) poaches the meat in fat
2) disassembles the meat and skin and bones and removes subcutaneous fat
3) reforms boneless meat in skin and press for extended period
4) roasts at high heat in oven to crisp the skin.
It was a taste revelation - Doritos for the truffled class - what you munch on while sampling the Widow. We love to eat, but love to snack more. This was snack nirvana......bring on the confit. Richard has agreed he'd even pretend to watch sports if this was the snack food.
Oh yes, there was the surround - turnips, scallops, chives - wonderful, savoury - not succumbing to the sweet side (as often happens with duck) - the crustaceans were successfully married with fowl
Quay delivered original and challenging flavour combinations while retaining ingredient individuality, plus excellent service, a postcard quality view and good value.
We'd go back tomorrow if we were not at the end of our Australian adventure.....but we'll return.
A Quay post script. One of the surprise attractions is watching the people on the Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb. Now, we enthusiastically do most absurd things, but we were amazed that you can take a walk over the Harbour Bridge. See the very, very tiny people at the top in the large scale shot of the bridge......and in blurry telescopic below. If we had time we'd probably do it!
