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Tuesday May 22, 2012

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Ela Carte dives into the Atlantic

Posted by: Ela Carte | 6 May, 2011 - 11:11 AM
The Seafood Platter at The Atlantic restaurant, Crown

The Atlantic at Crown  – www.theatlantic.com.au

Yet another big restaurant opening at Crown, this one with a oceanic bent. Atlantic promises fresh, sustainable local seafood, in a stunning setting and cooked under the stewardship of an extremely regarded chef. That man is Donovan Cooke, and his first foray back into the Melbourne food scene is already generating a buzz and plenty of bookings

Straight into the food, and once again we were faced with one of those menus that makes it extremely different to choose just a couple of dishes – it all sounds extremely tempting. For entrée, I went for the Blue Swimmer Crab salad ($29), thin slices marinated beetroot carpaccio covering the plate, each round slice garnished with a small clump of crab meat, chopped native finger limes, basil along with beetroot jelly and reduction. It was visually stunning, with bags of taste, great textures.
The Steamed Diver Caught Sea Scottish Scallops were served in the shell with glass noodles, garlic, ginger and soy ($35) – it was wonderfully simple, allowing the full taste of the scallop to come through.

For mains, the choices are between whole fish on the bone, dishes served off the bone, and a handful of non-seafood options. For each fish delivered on the bone, you need to decide if you want it wood fired, roasted or steams, and there’s a choice of four sauces. We went with the woodfired garfish (two of them) with salsa verde ($44). For me, it’s far too finicky a fish to have whole, too much hard work pulling out those tiny little bones.
But the Woodfire grilled Kingfish fillet with wilted witlof, ruby grapefruit, mint coriander and blood orange reduction ($42) was a beautiful piece of fish. Wonderfully cooked, the fish on its own still would have blown me away. Funny how you order a dish and then when it arrives, think …”hmm, it’s a bit grapefruity”. Yes, as it said, it contains grapefruit.

Plenty of salad and vegetable sides, but the woodfire grilled Zucchini with goats curd, pine nuts and garlic ($12), is the one I’d come back for. Beautiful, tasty, and healthy (gorgeous, gooey curd aside!), a bowl of that would almost do me for a weeknight dinner. Also tried the grilled fig salad with rocket, parmesan, honey, black pepper ($12) – only one fig which was a shame.

Yes, this place is pricey, for entrees and mains and two glasses of wine each we paid $224. Where most restaurants will have entrees that generally average under $20, The Atlantic’s are firmly priced between $20 and $35, with your mains sitting around the $40 - $45 plus sides. I suppose this may be the price you pay for a large range of guilt-free, sustainable seafood cooked well in a stylish riverside setting. Sometimes we like splashing out a little more for a special afternoon/night and The Atlantic isn’t a bad choice for that.

Expensive wine list (waiting on details) so we went by the glass tasting each of a Yering Station MVR (Marsanne Viognier Roussane) and a German Wittman Estate 08 Riesling.

All in all it’s an enjoyable experience, aside from good eating there’s no music drowning out conversation, just a steady buzz from diners and waiters, and the odd booming voice from behind the pass in the open kitchen.

3AW Food - Eating Melbourne

3AW Food 3AW is Food: Melburnians love to eat so it's fortunate we live in the culinary capital of Australia. On this dedicated food page you will find the latest recipes by Bob Hart as well as Tony Leonard's Pub of the Week reviews. La Luna head chef Adrian Richardson also serves up a dish from his own cook book and food reviewer Ela Carte visits one of Melbourne's hottest eateries weekly.

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