L37 Nigel Brings a Taste of the Sea to the REX Kitchen

Wine report by Stephen O'Halloran

A cosy group of 30 or so sat down to an excellent meal, initially prepared by Nigel Burton, then finished off by Amosh, with assistance from our stand-in sous chef George Winyard, and canapés by Greg Brunner.

Our Chef d’Jour, Nigel, was called away on an urgent family drama late that morning, but disaster was completely avoided by the excellence of the back team. Well done all round!

Canapés were first class, the main was ling with a lovely risotto-style seafood dish as the accompaniment, and Mark Bradford finished off with a delightful Australian Brie from Queensland. Good work all round.

The canapé wine was a real cocktail of Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling & Silvaner from the Victorian producer Schmolzer & Brown, 2024 @ 12%. It proved to be an acceptable canapé wine, which sat well with the delicious canapés, especially the terrine. A well-made wine, pleasant tasting, good balance & a clean finish. Overall rating: enjoyable, without rising to any great heights.

The first lunch wine was a cracker. A Tapanappa Chardonnay from the master of Australian Chardonnay, Brian Croser. 2017 @ 13.3%. Any way you looked at it, this was an outstanding wine. Elegant & restrained, but with powerful flavours. Now a nine-year-old wine, but drinking beautifully. So well balanced, with an enduring finish. A Croser masterpiece.

The next wine was a French Pinot Noir, a Clerget Bourgogne Rouge 2017 @ 12%. A pleasant enough wine, but without much character. An entry-level French Pinot from a good vintage year. Sat quite well with the main.

Wine 3 was a Hochkirch Victorian Riesling @ 11.9%. Lots of Germanic hints, but without the class. Heaps of residual sugar. A pretty ordinary wine, entirely forgettable.

The final wines for the day were a group of Fridge Drops selected by our Winemaster. All were high-quality wines. Our table scored a Houghton’s Gladstone Cab 2008 @ 14% from Margaret River. A totally excellent wine.

My wine of the day, the Tapanappa.

Food Report by Mark Bradford

A mild spring day and Nigel Burton’s Blue-Eyed Cod should have gone hand in hand today, with Nigel being renowned for his seafood meals. But there was no Nigel as he had to attend to an emergency at 11 am. As luck would have it, Nigel prepared all the ingredients for the main meal and salad, and left head chef Amosh of the REX to get the main in order. Not a bad chef to have up one’s sleeve. Not only was there no Nigel, but there was no Blue-Eyed Cod! As Nigel later said, “a call out to Get Fish at the Sydney Fish Market,” who rejected the pre-ordered cod, consisting mostly of tail, and replaced it with centre pieces of ling. Helping on the day and preparing canapes were Greg Brunner and George Wynyard.

Canapés

Three delightful canapés today. Greg started us off with duck and port terrine on lavosh crackers and topped with a pickled cherry. Pork shoulder, pork back fat, duck breast and chicken livers were mixed with orange and lemon zest, freshly ground cinnamon and nutmeg, and allspice. His second was a potato, onion and Gruyere tart: puff pastry and confit onions and thyme, thinly sliced kipfler potatoes and a mixture of mascarpone and Gruyere. Finally, George presented a well-crafted watermelon carpaccio. Many ingredients: mint leaves, red onion, cucumber, bell pepper, olive oil and red wine vinegar went into the blender and salt, pepper and tabasco were added to taste before being chilled in the refrigerator overnight to allow the taste to develop and to thicken. The carpaccio was garnished with finely chopped mint and caviar.

Main

Nigel noted later that Amosh carried out his instructions to perfection, making the risotto as moist as possible. 9 kilos of fish heads and bones – mainly prawns, snapper and barramundi – were used for the stock, to which onions, celery, carrots, fennel and tomato paste were added. The risotto was based on a formula of 1 litre of homemade fish stock to 300 grams of rice, baked for 25 minutes at 180 C. After checking for texture, prawns, mushrooms and snow peas were added to cook for a further 5 minutes. The meal, however, was missing the final salt, pepper and lemon adjustment that Nigel would have performed. Nonetheless, and as mentioned in comments in the room, a fantastic risotto.

Cheese

Nigel requested a triple cream brie, and the Cheese Master obliged accordingly with a brie from the Woombye Cheese Company on the Sunshine Coast of Queensland. This washed rind artisan cheese has a delicate white bloom on the outside that hides a deliciously rich, creamy and silky centre. It features a buttery, melt-in-your-mouth goodness that gets more luxe as it ripens. According to a nameless critic, it is “voluptuous to the point of having delicious, indecent effects.”

Today’s loaf was from Bonfire Bread in Mosman.