Category Archives: Steak

Rockpool Bar & Grill, Sydney CBD

rockpool bar and grill room

I recall the first time I walked into Neil Perry’s Rockpool Bar & Grill about 6  months ago. You see my Inner Burmese (no road sense) had struck again and I promptly got lost and I meant to walk into Spice Temple. I felt like a child walking into an adult’s domain. Everything was incredibly tall and silver and sleek, like New York’s Chrysler Building. The pillars were sky high and reached to the higher than high roof. I in turn felt like little I was little more than 80cms tall and a child in high heels. Waiters in white jackets bustled about, men in suits lunched and I almost expected Don Draper to walk past me. I vowed to come back. One day. Maybe when I was grown up.

crockpool bar and grill

Fast forward to a few months later and I was lucky enough to be taken here by Winston and Sandra. Just a couple of weeks ago, it was newly minted by the SMH’s Good Food Guide as the Best New Restaurant. On the table are four books plus the large paper menus that are printed out each day. There’s the Red Wine menu, the White Wine menu and then there’s also a booklet that explains the differences between the types of meat.

Lastly there’s the cocktail menu with a page of “Rockpool Bar & Grill House Rules” which may be terrifying at first for a split second before you realise they’re meant in an amusing way. Things such as “Gentlemen, do not approach ladies, and if you’re lucky enough to have one approach you, endear her as you would your Mother”; “Don’t look fiercely at people, or talk loudly or  harshly, but cultivate a smiling countenance and a quiet, but firm tone of speech” and of course ” No hooting, no hollering”. And to add to the retro Mad Men vibe, service is old school deferential and unfailingly polite.

rockpool bar and grill rules

The House Rules

There is much indecision when faced with a menu like this. There are cold plates, hot plates, salads and then there’s the grill section. And who’s kidding whom? The grill section is where you want to plant yourself firmly. It is however an expensive patch of Real Estate with steaks heading up towards $110. This is why this particular restaurant is off limits on most corporate lunch lists. Neil Perry advises people to share steaks to try and taste the differences between them. The cynic among us would think this was to help repay the way for the reported $35 million fitout for both the Bar & Grill and Spice Temple. Yes in Perry’s world there’s no such thing as a GFC and I chuckle at the last House Rule “Remember, nothing is on the house, except for the roof” .

rockpool bar and grill bread

Bread and butter

The bread is a lovely crunchy sourdough baguette slice and the butter is sublimely creamy like a lovely French butter.

rockpool bar and grill setting down

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Manta, Woolloomooloo Bay Wharf

I am an odd creature in Winter time. During Summer I am a night person and love going out at night but in Winter I prefer to stay in at night and huddle close to warmth. My solution to this Winter Night-time hibernation is going out during the day when the sun is shining and then retreat back into the house at night when the sun has gone down and the temperature dips. This also is good for the species Foodus Bloggerus. This ensures that we get enough light to photograph our meals whereas dining at night means that I don’t have to eat at 5pm to catch the last vestiges of light. So on Sunny days you’ll find me perched outside, lizard style, bathing in the warmth and getting my Vitamin D before scurrying home. One such day was our Sunday afternoon lunch at Manta on the sexy Woolloomooloo Finger Wharf, just around the corner from where Russell Crowe and other lucky individuals live.

We’re seated across from the wharf where in October, they’ll host an Oyster festival featuring the best oysters of the season. We take a look at the menu – Manta is known for its seafood but their meat page (done in a leather look material) is beckoning. Is it silly to go to a seafood restaurant and order steak? Perhaps, but Mr NQN is liking the look of the steaks. We order some entrees and mains based on their recommendations (I always ask for staff recommendations) and sit back and soak up the sun while nearby boats bob up and down on the sparkling water.

1/2 dozen chef mixed oysters $25

We’re served three types of oysters: the Clair de Lune from Batemans Bay, Coffin Bay Pacifics and Sydney Rock Oysters from Port Stephens. As similar as oysters appear to be, when faced with the three different types we taste they’re also quite distinct. The Clair de Lune is sublime and my favourite of the three, the Pacific is rich, creamy and enormous and the Sydney Rock is all briney deliciousness.

Raw Selection $38

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Mumu Grill Take It Slow dinner #2, Crows Nest

Despite how it sounds being Tweeted is not a bad thing. Particularly when you’re tweeted things such as “2 Prime rib into the oven for 4 hours. Tonight’s take it slow dinner.” and “bone marrow roasted, mixed with chopped parsley and into sauce” from Chefmumu (aka Craig MacIndoe) who is busy preparing the night’s dinner and whetting our appetites with what he has in store for us. He is also the brains behind a great offer for you readers (read on!).

Polin & Polin Hunter wines

The Lamb Oven

Duck Fat potatoes: worth the applause

When I arrive along with a gaggle of other hungry, excited bloggers, we get another quick impromptu peek into the kitchen, past the furiously hot ovens to reveal the delicious Duck Fat potatoes, the other oven which has slow roasted the Lamb for 13 hours and the display of wines from Polin & Polin wine.

Kumatoes which then become…

Kumato relish

18 month Jamon

After our little tour, we’re ushered into the Tapas Bar where we’re fed delicious, delicately laid sheets of 18 month Jamon Serrano while watching a short documentary featuring a visit to Graham Strong’s Arcadia Saltbush Lamb farm which he runs with his parents and how the drought tolerant plant Saltbush makes such an impact on farming.

Slow Roasted Arcadia Lamb done 2 ways: View 1

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Take It Slow Wine Dinner at Mumu Grill, Crows Nest

Craig Macindoe from Mumu Grill

Some restaurateurs are canny. Craig Macindoe from Mumu Grill is one of them. Whilst some restaurants lack even a basic website, some realise that not only is a website crucial, but your presence is also commanded on places such as twitter and facebook as that is where your diners are too. After Good Living printed a list of chefs and people in the food industry (food bloggers were largely absent from this list) chefs scurried online and figured out what twitter was quickly. Craig was there tweeting well before this mass invasion and as someone who sees the potential in food blogging, he invited 10 of us to dine at his Take It Slow Wine Dinner on him.

Craig and one of the Arcadia Saltbush lambs

The Take It Slow movement was started by Italy’s Carlos Petrini in 1989 as a way of consciously combating fast food and life and presumably to preserve La Dolce Vita in response to people’s waning interest in the food they eat and its origins and how our food choices impact the rest of the world. In turn this dinner involves letting us know all about how the food and wine is produced and knowing who and where it comes from. This dinner celebrates the Slow Food Movement in that the produce and cooking time took a total of  18 months (the 18 month jamon), 16 hours (the slow roasted Saltbush lamb and double roasted duck) and 40 minutes (the brown sugar pavlova).

Hanging the meat to tenderise it

Dining with me tonight are: Simon, Howard, Shez. Anna, Arwen, Lisa, Trina, Jennifer and Steph. At 6pm we’ve arrived to have a pre-dinner tour of his kitchens and backstage. Yes for a food blogger, a kitchen visit is like getting a Backstage Pass to meet your favourite artist. He shows us the cool room where they hang their meat for several days to tenderise. He also shows us the whole lamb, about 6 months old and about 12 kilos heavy and proceeds to hang that too. He points out that the space is cleaned and tested every 2 days for bacteria which you need to do if you hang meat. Hanging meat helps to break down the fibres in meat which in turn, makes it more tender and soft.

He also shows us the food preparation for tonight. The catalan bread is topped with tomato oil which is a fantastic and incredibly tasty sauce and it is topped with 18 month Jamon. We also see the duck which has been cooked twice and we take a peek (not too far in) into the purpose built meat oven.

The olives are juicy and spiked with rosemary and are delicious. We’re given a Mr Riggs Viognier 2008 and a Mr Riggs “Yacca Paddock” Tempranillo 2007.

The smell from the kitchen is beckoning but first we hear from Graham Strong, from Arcadia Saltbush Lamb who along with his parents raise the lambs on a diet including that of Old Man Saltbush in the Riverina district of NSW. They are suppliers to not only Mumu Grill but also Becasse and Etch. I wrote earlier about Saltbush lamb and the benefits of raising lamb on this but in short Saltbush is a hardy perennial which helps to reduce the salinity in soil which helps in times of drought which of course we have a lot of in Australia.  They are also part of the WWOOFing movement (Willing Workers on Organic Farms) where in exchange for working on the farm, you get accommodation and food and get to be part of the experience.

Arcadia saltbush lamb roasted for 13 hours served with minted eggplant and white bean paste, green beans, beetroot jus

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Mumu Grill, Crows Nest

All meat is just not meat, that much is clear from our first turn of the Mumu Grill’s menu page. It is a place that takes its meat very seriously. Sustainable and organic produce is their focus and it serves only grass fed beef, a beef that a lot of restaurants eschew because of the variability in quality due to the reliance on things such as rainfall which in turn affects the grass. To overcome this they have 4 beef suppliers. We read that grass fed beef is also said to contain more Omgea 3’s than grain fed beef and is said to have 3 times more Omega 3’s than farmed salmon although of course the salmon farmers would disagree on this point.

All of the pork here is Sweet Bangalow Pork and the Lamb is Arcadia Saltbush. For those unfamiliar with Saltbush Lamb, it is free range lamb that has been fed on a diet of “Old Man Saltbush”. This Saltbush is a hardy, drought tolerant perennial that also helps reduce soil salinity which means that it has the ideal characteristics for Australian soil. There is also a distinct taste from the Saltbush plant. Both the grassfed beef and saltbush lamb are lower in fat because most beef and lamb are “grain finished” which means that they were fed grain in order to fatten them up quickly before they are sent to the abattoir whereas these are not resulting in a leaner meat and therefore one that is best cooked below a medium level.

Decor is very nice indeed as is service here and we look forward to our meals, particular the Kona Coffee crusted Beef and Saltbush lamb. We start with a selection of Tapas dishes – and for tapas lovers, to the left there is a tapas bar where diners can sit with a cocktail or drink and nibble on all sorts of Spanish goodies. We have ours at the table.

Jamon Iberico de Ballotta $25

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