September 24. You’ve got two months (from the time of this blog post) to get to Moon Park, Sydney’s most elegant modern Korean restaurant. Hidden away on the second floor of a corner building in Redfern, their lease it up, and they’re offering until then, only tasting menus.
But there is something for everyone. Our non-seafood eating friend stuck to the vegetarian tasting (as did S.) while J. and I had one of each of the other dishes so we could share. Everything was good, with quite a few wows. The crispy seafood pancake is elevated to a level of yumminess above your standard Asian pancake. Lamb = delicious. Their interpretation of BiBimBap = wonderful. We had two bottles of an odd, older white wine, a Chardonnay from California ($40 a bottle) and the tasting menu is $59. Very reasonable prices for such beautiful, thoughtful, carefully presented food.
I think this was the third time I’ve eaten here over the years. Korean flavours are still unfamiliar to many people, and to refine them into fine dining is a real treat. I found it amusing and engaging to recognise or almost recognise a flavour or texture, and think about how it was applied to the dish. That bright green chrysanthemum leaf sauce was beautiful under the lamb!
Desserts (top photo) were the highlight. The ‘moon pie’, a cornucopia of flavours… and the sweet potato ice cream. Apparently they’re looking for another venue. Hope so. It would be sad to lose Moon Park from Sydney’s dining scene. It wasn’t an evening where I felt like taking photos of everything. You’ll just have to go there yourself!