Nel restaurant has a new degustation concept features Chef Nelly Robinson's take on fast food reimagined into fine dining featuring all of your favourite fast foods from pizza, biryani, fried chicken with caviar, donuts and milkshakes. Come along and see what it is like!
Being open in a city as fickle as Sydney for 10 years is no small achievement. We first visited Nel just after it opened in 2015 and loved the food. Since then I've travelled to Northern England with Chef Nelly Robinson thanks to the team at Visit Britain. And now 10 years later we are back to try the newest degustation menu: fast food, fine dining Nel style.
The space at Nel is all about sexy, darkly lit, subterranean fine dining. Chef Nelly Robinson is known for his theming - past degustation themes include "Once Upon a Time" series, the "Story of Christmas," "A Trip to Broadway" and KFC inspired dinners.
"We have three themes every year: Native Australian which really showcases our beautiful country, British menu which showcases memories of Britain but still using our amazing native ingredients from our home, and story of Christmas which is a story of memories of Christmas. I actually love all of them as we get to create a brand new menu for each menu. We always come up with new ideas and dishes and that's why we've been around for 10 years as we always reinvent ourselves, we want guests coming to Nel and feel they've had a experience and not get served what you can cook at home," explains Nelly.
The new menu focuses on "Fast Food" and Nelly's takes on it. There are 12 courses on this menu for $189 a person plus matching wines or non alcoholic drinks as well as cocktails available. I really enjoy my alcoholic version of a milkshake made with white rum, vanilla, gingerbread, malted cereal milk, supasawa (lemon juice type of mixer) and butterscotch. Mr NQN loves his Spider cocktail made with blood orange gin, Fanta, tonka bean, acid corrected orange juice, Campari and marshmallow foam.
We start with the first course and it is a panipuri. This popular Indian street food is a thin, crisp shell usually stuffed with potato but here they fill the shell with a delicate curry crab flavoured with native spice curry with ground coriander powder, sorrel leaf and tamarind and tomato water in a test tube that you add to the panipuri before eating it in one satisfied mouthful. The mouthful is crunchy and aromatic elevated with crab curry and tomato water and caraway seeds. It the perfect amuse bouche to get all the taste buds firing.
They explain that Nelly chose to feature a soup and sandwich as it is British lunch staple. On the left is a garlic mushroom soup paired with a wild mushroom toast with mushroom spread on top. The soup is super light and foam with lightly toasted mushroom toast and the flavour of sticky, sweet roasted garlic.
The next course comes in a mini pizza box holding a single slice of Nel's version of Margherita Pizza. The base is a paper thin brik pastry that is so delicate, light and crisp topped with a spicy red Romanesco sauce, stracciatella and basil foam. I love the texture of the crisp pastry and the warm flavours of the Romanesco, tears of stracciatella and light basil foam.
The taco is a purple corn tortilla with fermented chilli , jalapeno and pineapple juice marinated tuna and pickled pineapple cubes down the centre. While this is entirely familiar as a taco, we really enjoy the luscious tuna and the piquancy from the pineapple and a little growl of smokey heat from chilli right at the end.
One of the funniest things was that the two tables at either side of us were ahead by a few courses so we got to see what was coming up and what people really liked and the biryani is the course that everyone really seemed to love.
It is biryani turned into a soup with chicken biryani broth which is full of flavours from chicken, sweet onions and spices and topped with crunchy puffed rice and a naan bread foam. The depth of flavour in this soup is wonderful and it really does capture the essence and flavour of biryani. "Indian food is my absolute fave and I will eat a biryani with naan bread when watching football after work," says Nelly.
Mr NQN also tries their version of Cola made with Buffalo Trace boubon, Cocchi americano, cola, looomi (dried limes) and lime acid phosphate that has a nice blend of flavours not dissimilar to homemade cola. I go for a non alcoholic cocktail called the Apple Menage a Trois with vanilla and apple caramel, acidulated apple and apple. This is a bit on the sweet side for me and I would have loved a bit of acidity in it.
The NFC or Nel Fried Chicken is Nelly's version of KFC. "After our success with a collaboration with KFC we brought our own spin on fried chicken" says Nelly. The wildfire spiced chicken is marinated for 48 hours before being rolled in cornflour and then deep fried and finished with caviar. It comes in a paper cup of umami-rich roast chicken gravy. Is it improper to drink gravy from a cup? Guilty as charged. This is one very tasty bite of chicken so eat it slowly to savour it.
The baguettes are inspired by the classic ham and cheese sandwich. A warm baby house made baguette is served with cheese custard that has the same texture as butter and ham snow. This is a fun course and we spread the bread thick with the rich buttery custard and ham.
Chef Nelly brings this course to the table and quips, "It doesn't look like much. It's salmon marinated in absolutely nothing." But to this he adds lime, coconut, Thai basil oil and a Thai red curry dressing. Thai red curry has a gorgeously clean spicy sour broth that seasons the salmon perfectly and I especially love the spoonfuls with the crunchy crackers for texture.
Our final meat course comes in two parts so really we are having 13 courses. The first is a mini burger made with the trimmings of the Sirloin made into a patty with Nel sauce and American cheese for that unmistakable melt. This tiny burger packs a lot in one dainty bite with a nice smokiness to it.
And then comes the final savoury course: a beef sirloin steak "Cheeseburger" with gem lettuce tossed in beef fat dressing, onion and sesame tuile with a pool of mustard and chive sauce. The steak is cooked medium rare and while it's a bit complex to eat (I end up just cutting some steak and biting into the lettuce and tuile) it's delicious. I particularly like the succulent steak and the beef fat dressed lettuce and pickled onion.
They set down a striped straw for our milk shake but our dessert is not an actual milkshake but a milkshake inspired pre-dessert with strawberry cream, vanilla milk ice cream and crumble cake with tiny pieces of fresh strawberry. Normally I share my desserts because I only want a mouthful but strawberries and cream happens to be my favourite combination and this is absolutely perfect. And the straw? Just a playful joke.
The pranks don't end there. The donut while resembling a glazed Krispy Kreme is actually a blueberry and rosemary cream lavender cream cheesecake shaped in a donut ring. It has a dulcey caramelised chocolate dip and white chocolate glaze to give it that donut sheen. This is delicious although by now I am getting quite full so I want to finish it because my palate demands it but my stomach protests.
The very last course is a wooden display that features four types of petit fours. These can be eaten there or taken away in a Nel paper bag. There is a frozen freeze dried raspberry pop rocks marshmallow square, orange chocolate biscuit followed by a passion fruit white chocolate bonbon and salted caramel. You can pick 2 of these per person so we decide on one of each to be shared and eaten in the car on the way home!
So tell me Dear Reader, which course did you like the sound of the most? And do you like themed degustations or classic ones?
Nel Restaurant
75 Wentworth Ave, Sydney NSW 2000
Phone: (02) 9212 2206
Tuesday to Friday 5–11 pm
Saturday 12–4 pm, 5–11:30 pm
Sunday and Monday Closed
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