3 Dinners in One Night (and 2 the next)

I've been spending a lot of time in Melbourne recently and to say I've been eating well would be an understatement. Restaurants in Australia right now are some of the best I've eaten anywhere. You'd have to try hard to have a bad meal. My wait is probably feeling it a bit but I'm a bit shocked myself than I'm not pushing 100 kilos (thankfully).
One restaurant that's been getting a lot of praise lately is Garagistes down in Hobart. Since its only an hour flight from Melbourne, I made a last minute decision last week (flight booked at 10pm Friday) to fly out at 6am the next morning with the goal of eating at Garagistes.


While I did a lot in 36 hours, this is about the food. And there was a LOT of food. This restaurant doesn't take reservations which made this trip so easy to do, so I stalked the place half an hour before it opened to not get caught in a line. There was no line. There are only 200,000 people in Hobart and 500,000 in Tasmania. I guess I shouldn't be surprised.
So, I got an easy seat at the bar and went for the 5 course menu (there was a three course menu as well.) I stuffed myself with everything local on the menu. For one reason, the vegetable dishes have been the standouts lately. Knowing where your food comes from and who grows it makes a huge difference in the taste. Don't get me wrong, the calamari, sea urchin and pork neck were stellar. But the veggies were tops.






I wrapped up food and wine by stopping at Sidecar around the corner for some wine. Another great small wine bar (maybe 26 seats tops), with food by the same chef Luke Burgess. I've heard that Luke makes some of the best charcruterie so I couldn't pass it up. And holy shit. Some of the best salami I've ever had and the 5 month aged (turns out he forgot about it at the butcher) mutton with fennel was unbelievable. I got talking to Luke who was manning the stove and had to try the wagyu hot dog. He even tricked it out by wrapping it in the salami a la NYC Crif Dog.



Totally unnecessary but completely addictive. I told him I came down basically for dinner and would have like to try it all. So he called the restaurant and by the end of the night sent me back to have some of the courses I missed. And the warmed winter salad was the winner on the second go around.
I had initially planned on hitting Sidecar on Sunday before flying back to Melb so I stopped in again. They had a few specials based in what I said I really liked the night before at the first dinner. The best was a sea urchin with smoked bone marrow and pickled cauliflower. So clean and rich and addictive. He also had some cold water clams from water so cold, they've grown a second abductor muscle to eat. They were massive,sweet and served with fried hot dog bun that turned almost custardy in the juices.



I had a few other bites but they wrapped the meal with a homemade brownie. It was two textured with a dense lawyer on the blotter and a meltingly delicious brûléed top. A nice thanks for stopping by.
I'll certainly be back and was told to send them a heads up and they'd bring in some other special ingredients. Something I'll surely try to take them up on.



All in all, a nice first experience in Hobart.