Marque (Surry Hills)

By St 

Boing! Boing! That’s supposed to be the sound of Tigger from Winnie the Pooh jumping in excitement. That’s how I felt eating at a 3 chef’s hat restaurant. Not only that, a few weeks after dining here, Marque was named the 2011 SMH Good Food Guide Awards Restaurant of the Year. Boing!

It’s hard to spot classy Marque on Crown Street but look for Bill’s and Billy Kwong and you will find Marque smack bang between them. Only recently did they start opening for Friday lunches so Timmy and I sacrificed a working day (oh, the things we do for food) to try out the lunch prix fixe ($45 pp).

Wow, a h'orderve to open up the palate and it presented itself in such simple elegance: a semi-poached egg. Chaud-Froid free range egg to be exact. It has two temperatures: the warm yolk and chilled whipped cream. Three flavours come from: salty grissini, sweet cream and sour from some vinegar. The idea is to dip the grissini into the runny egg to experience all three flavours at both temperatures all at once. Of course! I could have dreamt of that in my sleep. You could also smell the subtle aromas coming from the clove, chives and nutmeg. 

Chaud-Froid free range egg

Hmmm… the entrée looks like a science experiment. Despite the tremendous greenness, this experiment was a success! The incredibly big chunks of fresh kingfish, swimming in the green pea sea with bursts of lime was marvelous. Having been to Japan and drinking their matcha latte like it was water, I am going to say I am a matcha expert (green tea). For those who don’t like it, never fear as the matcha in this dish is so subtle, I the expert, could not detect it :(

Kombu cured kingfish with pea, matcha tea and lime

I don’t have duck much (except the fatty ones with my pad thai) but I’m telling you, this was one super soft and silky duck. The green flowers are nasturtium, used to pretty up the plate but also edible (just tastes like chlorophyll). The duck was incredible but teamed up with the fried quinoa, which added flavour and crunchy texture, this dish transformed from model to supermodel. Tyra would be thrilled and it also took a fierce photo.

The staff suggested we have the potato puree with grand cru butter (extra $14) with the main. It was creamy, not too heavy, and went well with the duck. 

Roast Muscovy duck with baby leek, quinoa and nasturtium

The pre-dessert was a sauternes custard and crème caramel. It was very bitter due to the wine and so I ended up scraping off the caramel and having the custard on its own. Like the egg earlier, I think this was to clean the palate but I would have preferred something else like sorbet. 

Sauternes custard

The smell of the violets and caramelized pastry was so heavenly. The entire plate looked so divine with the violet touches that you did not want to break and eat it but inhale, inhale. The apple and bayleaf icecream filling was good but mild, nowhere as tasty as its exterior. 

Smoked vanilla mille feuille with apple and violet

They must sponsor all the top restaurants around but again, Aesop soap in the bathroom!

I know a few people who were strongly disappointed when they went to Marque, vowing not to come again. These comments can’t be a coincidence. Maybe they were there for dinner and so I can’t judge but my experience from the food to professional service to the bathroom was very enjoyable.

Wokking rating /5:

Marque Restaurant

4/5 355 Crown St

Surry Hills

02 9332 2225

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SIFF- Becasse (Sydney CBD)

By St

Let's talk about lunch baby, let's talk about you and me. Actually, let's do lunch!

October is an exciting time for foodies because it marks the start of the Sydney International Food Festival (SIFF)! You might be scratching your head going, "really?", "have I been living under a rock?", but chances are that you have been to one of the many events rolled out such as the Night Noodle Markets at Hyde Park or a Sugar hit.

One event is "Let's do lunch", where some of top restaurants listed by the SMH, offer a lunch main and matching Brown Brothers wine, Coopers beer, San Pellegrino sparkling bottle or Acqua Panna still mineralwater for $35. I called in September to make a booking with Est. and it was already booked out. Next was Aria, and they only had Mondays left. It was third time lucky with Bécasse.

You might have seen Bécasse's head chef and owner, Justin North, on the most recent Masterchef season- Jonathon had to butcher a pig and cook North's suckling pig and cutlet in a cook-off. North, whose philosophy centres around selecting the freshest produce from farmers and growers daily and combining that with clever technique, won SMH Good Food Guide's "Chef of the year" award in 2009. His restaurant was the 2007 "Restaurant of the year" and runner-up in 2009. And for all the lads, at GQ's Men of the Year awards, Justin North was crowned "Chef of the year". Gosh, he is like the Johnny Depp of cooking.

Now back to food. Bécasse's "Let's do lunch" menu consisted of organic grass feed Gundooee Wagyu bresaola with smoked hazelnut and confit beetroot as an entree for an extra $15. Timmy and I decided to share this and he also had an oyster. It was different to other Wagyu I've had- I expected it to be more steak-like in taste but it was more salty like prosciutto. This shouldn't have come as a surprised if I knew what bresaola meant. Timmy loved his oyster, confirming that they do seek out the freshest at Bécasse.

Organic grass fed Wagyu bresaola $15

St Helens Pacific oysters $4

Before the food came out, along with with bread and butter, we were presented with Bécasse's own sweet biscotti with goat's cheese and black olive- c'est magnifique!

Bécasse biscotti

Onto the main focus of lunch- risotto of king prawn and prosciutto, with baby gem lettuce, leek and fine herbs. I never really thought risotto was all that. You hear more than often of people butchering their risotto attempts so I was never too keen. Fortunately Timmy was keen which was the deciding factor in choosing Bécasse over North's second restaurant, Etch. After eating this risotto, it is going to be difficult for other risottos to compete. Woah! They were not frugal with the prawns which was a delight because they were so plump and meaty. The risotto itself was like eating a warm, wholesome chicken and garden vegetable soup. Our plates were spotlessly clean afterwards. 

King prawn and prosciutto risotto $35

Part of the deal, we had the Brown Brothers Pinot Grigio and Tempranillo.

Brown Brothers wines from King Valley

This was such a wonderful opportunity to experience one of the best, fine-dining restaurants Australia had to offer. The icing on the cake was that it was all paid for by my winnings from the Girra NRL tipping comp hehe. We also got to witness the wait staff iron the table sheets ohh la la. 

We were too full to try Bécasse's cafe next door, Plan B, but I know I will be staking out there and Etch in the near future. 

Wokking rating /5: 

Bécasse

204 Clarence St
Sydney

02 9283 3440

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