As part of the Sydney Morning Herald Sydney International Food Festival (SIFF) the World Chef Showcase is coming to town, and to dinner, from 9-11 October.  Tickets are available via Ticketmaster.

It will be the biggest meeting of top-drawer chefs Sydney has ever seen and you can catch Neil cooking with Rainer Becker of Zuma London/Hong Kong/Istanbul & Dubai fame.

Rainer is well renowned for his hip, Japan-inspired resturants and he’ll be presented classic Zuma dishes – past, present and future alongside our very own Neil Perry – master of the Spice Temple, Rockpool and Rockpool Bar & Grill Sydney & Melbourne empire.

At the conclusion of this year’s Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide Awards Rockpool in The Rocks and Rockpool Bar and Grill Sydney both took home 2 of the coveted little hats each.

Rockpool Bar & Grill, Sydney, continued it’s award winning ways taking out the Best New Restaurant title.

For Simon’s full story on Rockpool Bar & Grill – winner of Best New Restaurant click here.

For a full list of this year’s winners click here.

FINE WINING AND DINING STANDS UP TO DOWNTURN

Article by Huon Hooke – Good Living – The Sydney Morning Herald.
Tuesday, 10th June 2009

Neil Perry on the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald online today. 

What do you eat with a $89, 510 bottle of wine? Click through to take a peek. http://www.smh.com.au/

Also featuring is Simon Thomsen’s review of Sydney’s most beautiful dining room, Rockpool Bar & Grill Sydney.

The Sydney Morning Herald online

Simon Thomsen Review, SMH Good Living, 05 May 2009

Neil Perry creates a deeply pleasurable dining experience all our own.

Let’s get the obvious out of the way.  This is Sydney’s most beautiful dining room.  A breathtaking, thrilling, dramatically gorgeous mix of art-deco panache and sleekly understated modernism with clever lighting, soaring three-storey high columns, shiny dark leather and sculptural towers of thousands of Riedel glasses.  They simply don’t make ‘em like this any more, especially in a city too eager to trash its heritage for a developer’s next shiny bauble.

Even in the open kitchen, the wood-fired grill has an ethereal shimmer as spotlights cut through the smoke.

Thankfully, Neil Perry’s multimillion dollar roll of the dining dice has the brains to match its beauty.  Rockpool Bar & Grill is the expression of a mature wisdom.  It’s about uncompromising excellence, wealth and discernment – perhaps a touch of braggadocio, too.  Money is not an issue.  Roast chook for two $78?  No worries.  This is a defiant stand against the new austerity drive.

It’s also a clever premise:  if you’re loaded enough to blow thousands of dollars on the classic labels on this stupendous 3500-bottle wine list (just 10 percent are under $100), then you don’t want it upstaged by fancy-pants fare.  But what do you eat with an $89,510, 1945 Romanee-Conti, allegedly the world’s greatest wine?  A rival business?

The Rockpool Bar & Grill concept has evolved in Melbourne over the past four years and, like most products, version two has the bugs ironed out.  It integrates Rockpool (fish), Perry’s misguided rebranding of his Rocks restaurant, while the bar and grill part tags it as a steakhouse, with 11 beef cuts as the headline act.  Yet seafood is often the show-stopper.

Perhaps the pony-tailed baby boomer, after three decades of high-pressure and high-wire cuisine, is taking stock.  This expansive 60-plus-dish menu is scattered with childhood reassurances.  Think creamed corn ($9), macaroni and cheese ($9-$11), mushy peas with slow-cooked egg ($9) and onion rings ($9).  The son of a butcher has returned to his roots and nostalgia tastes better than we remember.

Are the steaks any good?  Perry suggests sharing a few, from four producers, grass-to grain-fed, to taste the difference.  However, when priced between $39 and $110 each, that’s an expensive experiment.  All you get is meat, albeit deftly char-grilled, plus condiments.  They’re not always the softest cut but the depth of flavour from the on-site dry-ageing process is revealed in the Blackmore 220-gram wagyu skirt ($39) and Greenham’s grass-fed yearling 480-gram on-the-bone rib eye ($65).

The menu’s alternatives range from wood-grilled quail ($24) with smoky tomato and salty olives to a slightly stringy duck ragu on flabby, wide pappardelle ($19), annoyingly described as “noodles”.

Luminous gravlax-style dill-cured ocean trout ($19) with clove-scented red onion to layer on bruschetta yourself is as delightful as chilli, lemon and parsley marinated king prawns (3 for $30) with a sweetly smoky scent from the charcoal roast.

Even leatherjacket, a criminally underrated fish, is given a new eloquence when lightly battered and served on “crazy water” ($29), a light Neapolitan fisherman’s stew of tomato and garlic, infused with basil.  Tuna tartare with Moroccan eggplant, harissa and cumin mayonnaise ($29) is as smoky, complex and mysterious as Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca.  My only disappointment was the black-lip abalone meuniere ($99).  It’s not bad, just insipid in comparison.

It’s surprising to see so many of the old Rockpool team here, including maitre d’ Tom Sykes.  They’re snappily dressed in black and white, with jackets and ties, yet seemingly more comfortable in these surrounds.

On my first dinner, desserts fail to excite.  Second time around, Catherine Adams belts a home run with an apple galette, brown-butter ice cream and candied hazelnuts ($18) that’s pure pleasure.  Black forest trifle ($20), inspired by The Fat Duck’s BFG, is a decadent climax that goes pretty close to causing one.

An artist’s rise is often aided by an indulgent patron and Neil Perry found one in the US multi-millionaire David Doyle, who underwrote this bold $35-million venture, which includes Spice Temple downstairs.  Doyle’s $9.5 million personal cellar underpins this as a world-class restaurant.  It’s not too elaborate, yet it’s deeply pleasurable, which is the point, after all.  And amazingly, it’s ours.

Rockpool Bar &  Grill
17/20
The summary Neil Perry shows the old chef still has a few tricks left with a superb, smoky steakhouse where excellent seafood is a bonus.
Value Reasonable, depending on your economic status, but not cheap.
Chefs Neil Perry and Khan Danis.
Owners Neil Perry, Trish Richards and David Doyle.
Service Sharp.
Food Steakhouse.
Wine A staggering array of costly, global heavy-hitters, spread accross various vintages, plus a strong US presence; 25 by the glass.
Vegetarians If you must.
Noise The electric hum of the power elite.
Wheelchair access Yes.
Prices Entrees $15-$30; mains $26-$110; desserts $6-$19; all cards.
Where 66 Hunter Street, city, ph 8078 1900.
When Lunch Mon-Fri, noon-3pm; Dinner Mon-Sat, 6-11pm.

Simon’s review of Spice Temple for the Sydney Morning Herald – Good Living

Spice Temple 15/20

The summary Neil Perry reignites his passion for Asian flavours with a great regional Chinese restaurant.
Value Strong.
Chefs Neil Perry and Andy Evans.
Owners Neil Perry, Trish Richards and David Doyle.
Service Well-drilled and knowledgable.
Food Modern Asian.
Wine 100 interesting, chilli-friendly wines at reasonable prices; 19 by the glass.
Vegetarians Numerous options.
Noise An up-tempo soundtrack.
Wheelchair access Yes.

ROCKPOOL, the fine diner that transformed Neil Perry into one of Australia’s – and the world’s – great chefs, notched up 20 years last Saturday. It’s a remarkable achievement for Perry, one of the pioneers of working Asian flavours in an Australian context.

Now, he has created this city’s best Chinese restaurant in Spice Temple, delivering the alluring venue we’ve waited a long time for.

It’s a last big roll of the dice for Perry, who seems reinvigorated by his $35 million gamble on two new restaurants in this glorious art deco building. Later this month, Rockpool Bar and Grill (a sibling for his successful Melbourne version) opens above Spice Temple.

You may remember the chef’s previous Asian eateries, under the XO brand, which had mixed success. This time his mojo is working. Don’t push open the video door and descend into this low-lit basement – it’s evocative of an opium den, with joss sticks perfuming the air – seeking a collection of Cantonese cliches. Instead, Perry has let rip with the fiery flavours of lesser-known Chinese provinces that, until now, remained largely untried here. It’s occasionally confronting food, often awash with chilli to deliver a mesmerising, addictive rush that red-lines the Scoville scale.

The menu has almost 50 dishes, clearly laid out and designed for sharing. Stir-fried lobster ($120) from the live seafood tanks is the only extravagance. Many mains fall under $30.

The $69 10-dish banquet is both a great deal and fine vehicle for Perry’s clever take on modern Chinese flavours. The remarkable parade begins with invigorating morsels of pickled radish and cabbage ($6, a la carte) and ginger-and-garlic cucumber ($8), before the heat comes to a crescendo over successive dishes, climaxing at lushly hot, sweet, sour and numbing pork ($28), then gelatinous beef fillet in “fire water” ($59) – a dark, oily smoky and caramel-tinged bean paste broth of burnt chillies – before the sweet, cool relief of watermelon granita ($14).

Along the way it demonstrates style and finesse. Take the preserved eggs with cool, silken tofu and a gingery soy, chilli and coriander dressing ($18). Also known as 100- or 1000-year-old eggs, the curing turns the whites into a clear, brown jelly, while the yolks turn green and often taste sulfurous – but not Spice Temple’s creamy version. It’s a delightful, satiny dish, crunchy with spring onion, that shows how well Perry plays with texture and contrast, cornerstones of Chinese cuisine.

There are monochromatic moments but there is enormous complexity and nuance, too, propelled by the variety of ways the chillies are presented: fresh, dried, pickled, salted, brined and fermented.

Jiangxi-style steamed eggplant with three flavours ($18) is a display of pork, coriander and garlic folded in the slippery eggplant for a hint of sweet and sour, while cumin-earthy, northern-style lamb pancakes ($8) are reminiscent of Indian dosai.

Brave souls will find much to like in stir-fried Crystal Bay prawns ($39) with four types of chilli. It’s hotter than a television evangelist’s vision of hell and Perry adds a twist to this Sichuan dish by adding salted duck egg yolks for creaminess in the sesame-scented sauce.

Three-shot chicken ($29) results in entertaining, interactive theatre. A small butane camp stove lands on the table; then comes a clay pot of chicken in sweet bean-paste broth, plus three shot glasses, containing Tsingtao beer, chilli oil and soy. Wait until it starts to bubble, the waiter explains, then, to bring it to life, add the three flavours to suit your tastes.

The room, where padded timber chairs surround bare black tables on red carpet, strives to evoke Oriental mystique but misfires in places. Five photo portraits of Asian women along a rear wall are no doubt meant to add exotic sensuality but seem a little too much like a male fantasy of mail-order brides.

The red-dipped timber vertical blinds around the main room look like Australia’s most expensive paling fence; however, dramatic spot lighting makes everything sexier. Anton Monsted’s funky, pumping soundtrack adds a nightclub vibe.

The fun cocktail list is based on the 12 signs of the Chinese zodiac and a menu of 12 fabulous teas does justice to China’s reputation. The wine list, capped at 100 bins, provides plenty of interesting drinking.

For dessert, I understand the appeal of chocolate biscuits with caramel ice-cream and coffee granita ($16) but it breaks the magical spell as well as overplaying the generously portioned meal.

The exciting, enticing Spice Temple is the best thing to happen to Sydney Sinophiles in many years.

Set in stone...celebrating Rockpool's 20th anniversary, Neil Perry has a had a profound influence on Sydney's dining scene. Photo by Sahlan Hayes.

NEIL PERRY may champion top produce but he says restaurants are “in the nostalgia business”. The chef has a lot to get misty-eyed about. His flagship fine diner, Rockpool, turned 20 on February 28. 

It’s a remarkable achievement in an industry that defines ephemeral. The 51-year-old marked the occasion with a minimum of fuss. “I thought turning 10 was incredible, even more so than 20, because there was a degree of disbelief,” he says. “At the time, not many Sydney restaurants had done that.”

After service the other Saturday night, Perry repeated his action from two decades earlier. He walked across the road to look back to his restaurant with a mixture of pride, amazement and pleasure.

“It was emotional,” he acknowledges. There’s been a lot of jus under the pass lights since then but, right now, Perry has little time to reminisce.

The Rockpool empire and its fortunes, which waxed and waned in that time, are on the rise once more.

On Thursday night in Sydney’s CBD, Perry opens his latest – and perhaps last – big project: Rockpool Bar & Grill. His father, Les, was a butcher. His three brothers, too, so a steakhouse suggests this ponytailed sirloin didn’t fall far from the carcass.

The opening night nerves should be familiar. This is Perry’s 14th time, give or take the odd rebrand. Think: Wokpool, XO (twice), Star Bar & Grill and MCA Cafe to name just a few. A decade ago, at his previous peak, there were five restaurants (not counting the noodle bars) under his command. Now it’s four, however, with 350 employees and more than $40 million invested, the stakes seem higher.

Some things change, others don’t.

“The terror and excitement are the same,” Perry says. “You’re always pushing, you always need more time and you’re struggling to get the builders out. First night comes and you wonder why am I doing this? It can be painful, frustrating and scary. I must be insane!”

Well, not quite.

“We learnt a lot from expansion in the late ’90s, so this time we’re a bit more prepared,” he says. “I’ve a clearer idea of what I want to do and how I’m going to do it.”

It was his US business partner, David Doyle, who gave Perry a “once-in-a-lifetime chance” in the grand green terrazzo space of City Mutual’s heritage-listed art deco building.

“We stood in the room and Dave said: ‘Should I buy it?’ And I said ‘Yeah, it’s the most fantastic room I’ve ever seen’,” Perry says. “I hope its sheer beauty will make people’s jaws drop.”

The chef says the luck on this project has fallen in his favour but there’s a wry coincidence at play, since the City Mutual building springs back to life 22 years after its instigators were laid to waste in the 1987 stockmarket crash. Despite Sydney dining’s current jitters, Perry is unwavering.

“To live a dream like this, I would put everything on the line even now,” he says.  Perry’s done just that, with the support and nous of his long-time business partner, Trish Richards. Rockpool’s 20th anniversary is as much a testament to her skills as it is to her cousin’s talent.

The restaurant’s highlights are many. The chef singles out being named as the fourth best restaurant in the world in 2002 as a particular pleasure.

Receiving three hats in The Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide is another, along with Gourmet Traveller’s Restaurant of the Year award.

The grand gestures in his generous support for charity are also fond memories.

His influence on a generation of chefs (who didn’t want Rockpool on their CV?) is notable, too. The prevalence on menus everywhere of Perry’s crab omelette is also proof of his influence.  “Passing on what you believe in is as important as living it,” Perry says. “A lot of great people came through here and hopefully went off with a philosophy of hospitality, generosity and professionalism.”

His lowlights? Losing the third hat, the first time in 1999, then again in 2006. Rockpool was almost lost two years ago when Perry abandoned fine dining, to rebrand it as a fish bistro. Twelve months later, he recanted.

“I missed fine dining,” he recalls. “More than any of my other restaurants, Rockpool is my food and a reflection of my experiences. I needed to admit my mistake and change it back.” 

As part of the 20th anniversary, Rockpool is serving a five-course tasting menu of “classics”. The date tart is as Sydney as the Opera House, however, Perry’s approach to nostalgia is practical. “We create memories for people, then clean garbage away and start again the next day,” he says.

Published in the SMH on Friday 9th January, 2009.

Got into the office early today; I had to head up to the new Spice Temple site to try and get the staff in and the builders out.  Who in their right mind would open a restaurant?

I answered some emails and quickly took a look at the Herald website, smh.com.au.  It was going to be my only news for the day.  Besides, Australia had won the Test and I wanted to make sure that only good things were written about my boys.  Then I saw it…a story by Jordan Baker about restaurants (http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/who-in-their-right-mind-would-open-a-restaurant/2009/01/08/1231004192765.html).  I don’t know why I read it, shouldn’t have really, but as I did I really felt I needed to post a comment back.  I felt compelled to.  I had to wave the flag for the team, so to speak.  I really never do it; no, I promise I never write letters to the editor, but this morning, with the weight of a restaurant opening on my shoulders and a huge debt building, I couldn’t stay silent.

In one part of the story, Baker was taking a shot at restaurants that have a no bookings policy and suggesting that in some way it is unfair to the dining public.  I took from it that perheaps the restaurateurs were doing this out of a flight of fancy just to see the patrons squirm and wait for a table.

The simple reality of it is restaurants that don’t take bookings usually serve more people during that particular service, and it is for that very reason those restaurants are more efficient and have lower operating costs.  The reason these restaurants are usually popular is that they are a very good value.  What they do with those operating savings is pass them on to the customers, so everyone is happy.  That is indeed why they are so busy, not just because they don’t take bookings, but because they are generally more affordable.

It is an expensive business to have a table sit empty while you are waiting for a booking to arrive.  Everyone in Sydney seems to want to eat at the same time and this is a problem for the expensive real estate that your restaurant is.  If you can spread the bookings out, great, but the easiest way to acheive this is by taking no bookings at all.  Customers get very good at understading they either come late, early or have a great drink at the bar and enjoy the ambience.  As it turns out, I have noticed that people do, in the main, thrive in this busy, buzzy atmosphere of a heaving restaurant.  We are fundamentally social animals and love being together.  I think, in many cases, places with really great ambience have it because people are waiting.  In fact, I’m sure it is so, as people wouldn’t queue unless there were a number of good reasons, one usually being it is good value and two, it’s a fun place to hang as well.

At a restaurant like Sopra – both at Danks Street in Waterloo and on Macleay Street in Potts Point – they have only 40 to 60 seats, yet they do over 120 customers every service.  Yes, you have to wait but your prize is beautiful produce, cooked well, at affordable prices.

This couldn’t happen if bookings were taken.  The owners would have to pay for the staff and all the other overheads out of a significantly lesser amount of customers; therefore those customers need to pay more, or other parameters of the business have to change.

In the end it is true; you can’t have your cake and eat it too.  Restaurants have to work from a business plan and to a budget.  The costs are rent, staff, food suppliers, beverages and general overheads.  Once GST is taken off the top and all of these other costs are paid, then hopefully there is a little left over for the operator.

A no bookings policy allows the restaurant to reduce some of these costs.  It is also important to note that we have lots of choice in Sydney, so if you want to book, there are many restaurants where you can, and if not, then get there early or late, or line up and enjoy the value.