So Wednesday’s nights Food Diary was a bit different than usual. Zomato (formerly Urban Spoon) has been noticing my restaurant write-ups. I met @Nickbarraclough and @sarasez for a coffee at Paramount a while back, and this lead to them inviting me to a #zomatomeetup. What is this, you ask, or not, as the case may be? About a dozen food instagrammers or bloggers and members of the Zomato team gathered for a special meal at the new Voulez-Vous restaurant on Hunt Street, combining Serbian cuisine with modern Mediterrean.

I love the concept. What I look for in a restaurant in Sydney is an interesting and memorable experience, and possibly with dishes or a cuisine I’m not familiar with. The Voulez Vous team was friendly, enthusiastic and ridiculously good-looking, and their passion for creating a great restaurant is clear. We got the feeling that even though they were putting on this special night for us, and pulling out all the stops, that they treat all their customers with special attention (and indeed, when I’d stopped by for a glass of wine a few weeks beforehand, they were just as friendly and welcoming).

In the meantime, there’s nothing that says welcome like a special cocktail: this was a house creation, a mojito diablo with fresh fruit, red bull, and some sort of blue liqueur! We were also treated to raki, a traditional spirit, which I’d heard about and always wanted to try. I liked it.

What for me was really spectacular were the entrees:

We had an assortment of seafood (above) and meat (below).

I think when food is hearty and solid, as it can be in Eastern Europe, a way to make it modern and elegant is portion control! The sarmice, the sausage, was just right: so savoury and delicious, yet I think a whole plate of it would be a bit rich indeed. I loved the kashkaval cheese, also also the tuna tartare on bruschetta (I convinced Nick to split everything, as we had alternate dishes). Before the mains, we had a lemon and golden quince sorbet as a palate cleanser which nicely reminded me of being introduced to these in France, many years ago. I loved that it was sweet and a little bit savoury. It managed to cleanse my palate already, though not make enough room in my stomach for the mains…

The meat main was ‘saach’, a traditional veal, cooked as tender as can be, with very rich potatoes and veg. It was very tasty though after pigging out on the appetizers, it was hard to polish these off. The seafood main was a sesame coated tuna steak with steamed vegetables. But somehow (perhaps the generous glasses of house wine, reasonably priced on the menu and with a good selection), I managed to find a second wind to tackle the desserts, a luscious nutella torte, which I thought had a nice homey feel…

And the ridiculously good poached pear which reminds me that when I’ve tried this at home, I’ve never poached the pears long enough. Soft, and beautiful with some contrasting sauces and a creamy foam, this was a highlight for me.

I’m very curious to see how Voulez-Vous will do, and hoping that the answer is well. It’s an interesting location, down on Hunt Street. There are some interesting restaurants nearby on Foster Street (Nomad and Bar H). Just next door is a fusion Korean-Mexican bar (I think) that I’m curious about. The spectacular Sub-Continental is next to that… and there’s apparently new restaurants opening nearby (and I’ve been told to try Nel’s on Wentworth). So, it’s turning into a real restaurant precinct which I think is a good thing, though competition in Sydney (and Surry Hills) can be fierce. I’d recommend that Voulez-Vous emphasise its Serbian roots, I think Sydneysiders would find the ‘Mediterranean’ description a bit familiar, and they’d not know that raki, saach and sarmice awaits them – and I recommend YOU to have some of those great appetizers and that poached pear. Thanks Zomato for the meet-up (and nice to meet you instagrammers and bloggers), thanks Voulez-Vous for the amazing hospitality, and best wishes. I’ll bring my partner to dine soon.

XO Sea

Quay surpassed any expectations that I had of it. Currently sitting at #58 in the World’s Best Restaurant list, it’s one of the few high-end Australian restaurants that I haven’t tried in my time here. It’s been on my list… at least since Peter Gilmore’s Snow Egg dessert landed in the consciousness of tens of thousands of Australians who watched contestants on Masterchef try to make it.

That view! That lamp!

So, I had the inspiration to book it for my birthday this year, falling on a Tuesday, so it wasn’t so hard to get in. We opted for the degustation menu with the regular, not premium wines, but really, before any of the food came, I was already there… The view. And the gorgeous glass lamp on the table. My god.

Surf n Turf (ahem, pig jowl with scallop)

Comparing the food to some other Australian restaurants, it felt more modern and complex than what I experienced the last time at Tetsuya’s; it’s not as avant-garde and bitter as Marque; it’s not as textural as Sepia. But it felt pretty much perfect: not showy but complex, the focus really was the flavours, rich and salty; and it was hard to choose a favourite: every dish was consistent, interesting and tasty.

Wagyu!

I won’t go into individual descriptions. In fact, I’d actually planned not to take as many photos as usual, but then couldn’t help myself. All that accomplished was not taking photos of half of the courses…

But I do have to comment on the Snow Egg.

Here you can see me below, all in heaven, surrounded by twinkling stars.

The dessert was extraordinary and unexpected. We did remember, upon tasting it, the components of the dish. There’s a gorgeous flavoured granita, sitting on top of a fool (custard mixed with fruit puree). The snow egg itself is a perfectly smooth meringue that has a shell, a sugar disc of praline melted over it, a thin layer of crunch. And then a beautiful soft yolk to the meringue; which is an ice cream. I vaguely recall the waiter saying the flavour of the dish changes seasonally. I think this one was plum.

The various textures were distinguishable but played with each other in such a complex way I actually had to close my eyes to not be distracted by my sense of sight. And in tasting the particular combination of flavours, and more so, the textures, I actually felt transported. I’m not sure where, but it was good. More on the snow egg (including a recipe, but I can’t imagine ever trying this) is here.

Apparently, the second dessert was also featured on Masterchef, and my god, this one was good too, although we had a version of it in Scandinavia. I can’t remember where. Each of the layers inserted into the chocolate holder were delicious, one was of milk, another of chocolate. Visually playful, delightful with the different textures. Yum.

And to finish things off, some lovely truffles, along with an espresso that I managed to half-spill on the white tablecloth, the coffee stain spreading like my embarrassment. Ah well, the waiter pretended not to see (service was top notch of course), and we stumbled out into a wet and wintry Sydney night, now counting myself a year older, and very happy to have tried Quay.

I’ve gone to some huge efforts to try to eat at lauded restaurants on my travels; but this one was just at my doorstep. How spoiled we can by our surroundings.