Burn the House Down - Astral Restaurant
As I think I mentioned in a previous blog, we haven't managed to go to Astral restaurant yet, despite it being (literally) outside our back door. However I did manage to book 2 seats at "Burn the House Down" last Monday.
This was a special evening where the chef (Sean Connolly) comes out half way through the meal and demonstrates the cooking techniques that he and his staff have used to make it. They did mention how many there have already been - I think it was about 12 - but I'm not sure. They seem to happen once every couple of months.
The theme was Italian food and we were presented with the following:
The antipasti included: cheese (I think it was Taleggio), parma ham wrapped round bread sticks, caramelised tomatoes (these were gorgeous), artichokes, small pieces of fried bread, tapenade and anchovies.
We had to sit at a group table of 6. This was unfortunate but couldn't be avoided, though we managed to get through quite a lot of the antipasti without anyone turning up. It was a shame not knowing whether anyone was coming as it meant that we couldn't eat it all just in case someone turned up. And in fact the other 4 guests did fail to turn up and the waitress offered to turn the table into a 2 seater for us - Brilliant!
But... just before she did so, they managed to recruit 3 passing gamblers from the casino so we didn't get to sit on our own after all. We chatted to the new recruits a bit but we also got to talk to ourselves for quite a lot of dinner so it wasn't too bad.
The pumpkin and amaretti raviolo was lovely. It was pretty sweet but served with what tasted like a kind of fish bisque which complemented it splendidly.
We then had a break, for Sean to come out and demo the cooking to us. It started with an Italian guy from Leichhardt playing a few songs on the accordion. I really enjoyed this, we all clapped along a bit and he tried to get people to join in singing (there was one chap at the central table who could really sing!).
Sean "came on" straight after. A kind of stage had been set up at the top of the restaurant with two hobs and cameras so that everyone around the restaurant could see what he was doing on the flat screens that were dotted around. We were lucky enough to be able to see Sean directly.
Sean turned out to be, rather surprisingly, from Yorkshire. It made it feel even more like watching a new version of Ready Steady Cook back in the UK! He cooked the risotto in quite a standard manner, although he chucked loads of butter in at the same time as the parmesan (i.e. the end). Sean (my Sean) was really impressed by the gold leaf, however I always feel that putting gold leaf on food is a bit silly. It doesn't look edible and it doesn't taste of anything.
The best bit came when Sean (the chef) was demonstrating how to cook the wild boar. He added some Pernod to the pan and set it on fire by tipping the pan up so that the Pernod came just over the edge and caught alight. I was very impressed, although I shall not be trying it at home.
The cocoa sauce is apparently a Tuscan classic and when the wild boar arrived a little later was absolutely superb. In fact I think the wild boar dish overshadowed all the other courses (and they were all great). It was also served with wet polenta, which was something new to me as I have only ever had grilled polenta. I was suspicious in general about wet polenta, it looks a bit sloppy and textureless. As it turns out, I was right about the texture (it's rubbish) but the flavour was actually very good (I had to eat some without the cocoa sauce to be able to taste it though). I think this was because the end of the cooking process was again adding loads of parmesan and butter.
The deconstructed tiramisu was very interesting, although a little trendy for my liking. I am more a good food, cooked well kind of girl. Not that innovation is bad, but I think innovation should be done to make the food taste better, not just for the sake of it. The dessert consisted of amaretto sorbet, mascarpone cream and coffee mayonnaise. Eaten together they tasted like tiramisu. What is the point of that?? They could have just made tiramisu. I did try all the components separately first; the sorbet was lovely, the cream bland (I think it was just sweetened mascarpone) and the mayonnaise very strongly flavoured. Also, irritatingly, there wasn't enough coffee mayonnaise to go with the quantity of cream and sorbet (see, this wouldn't have happened with real tiramisu).
There was also, at some point, a talk about the wine, which now interests me not at all. I did taste the wines throughout the evening and while I can say that I like some more than others, it doesn't hold a great deal of fascination for me. We got an amaretto cocktail with the dessert and I liked that a lot more (my tastebuds are clearly reverting to those of a teenage girl). I didn't drink it though (of course).
We were encouraged to go and see the new private dining room before coffee. I have omitted to mention the view so far, which is a bit of an omission when talking about Astral. It is situated on the top floor of the casino, which is just down from us towards darling harbour. Three of the restaurant walls are glass and you can see a wall of skyscrapers and also the harbour bridge. The private dining room comes off one of these glass walls and itself has glass walls. The view is incredible. The room seats 16, if we had 14 friends here we would definitely go.
Our table mates went back to their gambling, while we had tea and then came home happy. The next Burn the House down is in 2 months time and is French themed. Apparently there will be can-can dancers.
As I think I mentioned in a previous blog, we haven't managed to go to Astral restaurant yet, despite it being (literally) outside our back door. However I did manage to book 2 seats at "Burn the House Down" last Monday.
This was a special evening where the chef (Sean Connolly) comes out half way through the meal and demonstrates the cooking techniques that he and his staff have used to make it. They did mention how many there have already been - I think it was about 12 - but I'm not sure. They seem to happen once every couple of months.
The theme was Italian food and we were presented with the following:
- Italian antipasti
- Pumpkin and Amaretti Raviolo
- Squid ink and golf leaf risotto
- Wild boar with cocoa sauce
- Deconstructed Tiramisu
The antipasti included: cheese (I think it was Taleggio), parma ham wrapped round bread sticks, caramelised tomatoes (these were gorgeous), artichokes, small pieces of fried bread, tapenade and anchovies.
We had to sit at a group table of 6. This was unfortunate but couldn't be avoided, though we managed to get through quite a lot of the antipasti without anyone turning up. It was a shame not knowing whether anyone was coming as it meant that we couldn't eat it all just in case someone turned up. And in fact the other 4 guests did fail to turn up and the waitress offered to turn the table into a 2 seater for us - Brilliant!
But... just before she did so, they managed to recruit 3 passing gamblers from the casino so we didn't get to sit on our own after all. We chatted to the new recruits a bit but we also got to talk to ourselves for quite a lot of dinner so it wasn't too bad.
The pumpkin and amaretti raviolo was lovely. It was pretty sweet but served with what tasted like a kind of fish bisque which complemented it splendidly.
We then had a break, for Sean to come out and demo the cooking to us. It started with an Italian guy from Leichhardt playing a few songs on the accordion. I really enjoyed this, we all clapped along a bit and he tried to get people to join in singing (there was one chap at the central table who could really sing!).
Sean "came on" straight after. A kind of stage had been set up at the top of the restaurant with two hobs and cameras so that everyone around the restaurant could see what he was doing on the flat screens that were dotted around. We were lucky enough to be able to see Sean directly.
Sean turned out to be, rather surprisingly, from Yorkshire. It made it feel even more like watching a new version of Ready Steady Cook back in the UK! He cooked the risotto in quite a standard manner, although he chucked loads of butter in at the same time as the parmesan (i.e. the end). Sean (my Sean) was really impressed by the gold leaf, however I always feel that putting gold leaf on food is a bit silly. It doesn't look edible and it doesn't taste of anything.
The best bit came when Sean (the chef) was demonstrating how to cook the wild boar. He added some Pernod to the pan and set it on fire by tipping the pan up so that the Pernod came just over the edge and caught alight. I was very impressed, although I shall not be trying it at home.
The cocoa sauce is apparently a Tuscan classic and when the wild boar arrived a little later was absolutely superb. In fact I think the wild boar dish overshadowed all the other courses (and they were all great). It was also served with wet polenta, which was something new to me as I have only ever had grilled polenta. I was suspicious in general about wet polenta, it looks a bit sloppy and textureless. As it turns out, I was right about the texture (it's rubbish) but the flavour was actually very good (I had to eat some without the cocoa sauce to be able to taste it though). I think this was because the end of the cooking process was again adding loads of parmesan and butter.
The deconstructed tiramisu was very interesting, although a little trendy for my liking. I am more a good food, cooked well kind of girl. Not that innovation is bad, but I think innovation should be done to make the food taste better, not just for the sake of it. The dessert consisted of amaretto sorbet, mascarpone cream and coffee mayonnaise. Eaten together they tasted like tiramisu. What is the point of that?? They could have just made tiramisu. I did try all the components separately first; the sorbet was lovely, the cream bland (I think it was just sweetened mascarpone) and the mayonnaise very strongly flavoured. Also, irritatingly, there wasn't enough coffee mayonnaise to go with the quantity of cream and sorbet (see, this wouldn't have happened with real tiramisu).
There was also, at some point, a talk about the wine, which now interests me not at all. I did taste the wines throughout the evening and while I can say that I like some more than others, it doesn't hold a great deal of fascination for me. We got an amaretto cocktail with the dessert and I liked that a lot more (my tastebuds are clearly reverting to those of a teenage girl). I didn't drink it though (of course).
We were encouraged to go and see the new private dining room before coffee. I have omitted to mention the view so far, which is a bit of an omission when talking about Astral. It is situated on the top floor of the casino, which is just down from us towards darling harbour. Three of the restaurant walls are glass and you can see a wall of skyscrapers and also the harbour bridge. The private dining room comes off one of these glass walls and itself has glass walls. The view is incredible. The room seats 16, if we had 14 friends here we would definitely go.
Our table mates went back to their gambling, while we had tea and then came home happy. The next Burn the House down is in 2 months time and is French themed. Apparently there will be can-can dancers.
posted by Zoe at 5:57 PM
1 Comments:
Thanks for the write-up. I read about this event and was curious.
I agree with you totally about the idea of a deconstructed tiramisu. Can you spell pretentious? lol. I think that's why I love Japanese food. It's always about celebrating food in its simplest freshest format. None of this silly grandiose and showy faffing about.
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