Lana at Hinchcliff House is all about modern fine dining. There's saffron spiced pasta with spanner crab and tom yum to a Korean style wagyu rib cap steak or snacks made with the latest novel protein to hit Australia: cultured quail!
It's a busy Thursday night when Mr NQN and I arrive at Lana. The restaurant is located on the level 1 of the historic Hinchcliff House above Grana on the ground level. The atmosphere is different from what I expect, it's very bustling for a fine dining restaurant and more like a busy, upmarket bar vibe with some high tables and an after work crowd.
Tonight Mr NQN and I are trying a new protein now available in Australia. Cultured Japanese quail is made in a factory by Forged by Vow. If you enjoy foie gras but don't like the gavage or forced feeding process this is a more ethical alternative.
Cultured quail is made from a small biopsy, the size of an almond taken from a quail. From this one sample, they can produce an unlimited amount of meat. It grows for 3 months in a nutrient broth in stainless steel tanks and draws the nutrients from the broth to grow. At the moment Forged by Vow has four products: a whipped pâté, a foie gras, a smoked spread and tallow candles.
Already popular in Singapore, it has now rolled out in some restaurants in Sydney and Lana at Hinchcliff House is one of them. Lana's Head Chef Alex Wong created some snacks using the cultured quail foie gras and parfait. "Its a very unique product, it is quiet versatile and tasty, ethically sustainable so thats great for us. And you dont need to do much to it. It has a lighter and kind of mushroom flavour and aroma profile to it."
One of the dishes that is coming in December just in time for Christmas is the cultured quail tallow "butter candle" rolled in crispy chicken skin and roasted rice crumb that is served with the focaccia. This is served on a bed of Ortiz anchovies and the idea is to wait until the candle melts and then dip the focaccia into the melted tallow. It's wonderfully umami and it's a perfect bite when you get some of the quail skin crumbs, rice powder, anchovy, green onion and lots of the melted tallow.
Another snack using the cultured quail is the toasted shokupan or milk bread crostino with seared wagyu rib cap, cultured quail foie gras, oscietra black caviar and char siu sauce. You know when everything just pops in your mouth with the sweet, savoury, mouth watering element? That's this snack. A dozen please.
The duck doughnut is one of the most popular snacks and features a fried bao stuffed with confit duck, Davidson plum sauce, plum ketchup served with a squiggle of cultured quail parfait and garnished with oxalis or wood sorrel leaves on top to balance the rich doughnut with a light acidity. The parfait is light and blends in well with the other ingredients without a hint that it is grown in a factory.
The lobster prawn toast is one of those dishes that comes and goes from the menu. We're lucky that we are getting to try it tonight because it is a stand out. The bay lobster meat is served atop bread with the cultured quail foie gras. After frying it is then brushed with quail tallow and garum caramel and then toped with Tasmanian sea urchin. This is a luxurious and divine riff on prawn toast.
One of my favourite fusion dishes is tom yum spaghetti so when I saw the saffron capelli on the menu I had to choose it. The house made pasta has an aromatic hit of saffron as soon as it hits the table. There is a good amount of spanner crab and a tom yum flavour with a mildy spiced sambal and lots of butter to make it moreish. The pasta has the perfect al dente texture to it and I love the buttery halved cherry tomatoes and Thai basil to lift it. This pasta is double the price of other pasta dishes but it is a good sized portion so ideal to share.
Asian flavours pair well with wagyu as they give the rich meat a lift (although if you're looking for a traditional steak this isn't it). This is Stockyard MBS7 wagyu rib cap from Queensland, cooked overnight at 60C/140F in a pepper masterstock before being grilled to finish. It is served with grilled wombok cabbage and ssamjang inspired shallot puree, black pepper sauce, burnt leek dust and dried house kimchi powder. It's luscious, perfectly seasoned and not a bit goes back to the kitchen.
There are only two side dishes on the menu: potatoes and a green salad. The potatoes come in the form of potato gems with a sweet chilli powder and smoked mascarpone on the side. These go perfectly with the steak above.
I also recommend getting the green salad made with organic leaves, miso and shallots and wrapping up some wagyu in it.
We tossed up between the pineapple dessert and the strawberry cheesecake but we went with the eye catching half pineapple filled with panna cotta, cubes of castella-like sponge, fruit and pineapple granita with mint powder on top. If you like trifle then this dessert is for you. My favourite part is the granita on top that is refreshing and cooling on this sultry spring evening.
So tell me Dear Reader, would you try cultured quail or have you tried it already and what did you think?
This meal was partially funded by Forged by Vow but the rest was independently paid for.
Reader Comments
Loading comments...Add Comment