TEA Club was brought to you by the letter B….

As far as restaurants beginning with B in Sydney go…there are actually quite a few. Bodega, The Book Kitchen, Bistro Moncur, The Beresford, Billy Kwong, Mr B’s....just to name a few.

What caught our attention for our B eatery was recently (it was recent when we first heard about it!) opened Bloodwood in Newtown. This bar and restaurant towards the St Peter’s end of King St received a complimentary review by Terry Durack in the Sydney Morning Herald in March with enough praise to pique our interest and set our mouths watering.

After a month or two of deliberating on dates….since May and July are reasonably well-spaced apart, four members of the TEA Club (unfortunately the twins were unable to make it) got together to try out this newcomer and see for ourselves if Newtown was really only a place of mediocre fast foods and gastro-pubs.

So let me set the scene for our little review. Bloodwood sits nonchalant amongst a little row of street-front shops, and hurrying past in the rain I almost missed it. The goldfish bowl front of the restaurant plays home to little stools and tables stuffed with trendy young things escaping the London-like drizzle and enjoying a glass of red over discussion of the upcoming election. Venture further into the narrow, exposed-brick corridor and you pass by the open kitchen and up some stairs to a dining area and out the back, a moodily lit courtyard - which would be pure delight on long summer evenings.

True to the urban, converted warehouse feel of the place, artily arranged doors and exposed lightbulbs hang from the ceiling (an Alice in Wonderland obsessed interior designer perhaps?).

We started with a bottle of Prosecco, some warm marinated olives and thick bread with earthy, green (coloured, not climate friendly) olive oil, as suggested by our slickly tailored waiter. All of the above were lovely, including the waiter who was swift to accommodate our every need as well as up-sell the wines as smoothly as his moussed, dark hair. We didn’t mind – Wheels and Flying Carpet were too busy batting their eyelashes in his direction anyway.

Once Slow Loris arrived we settled down to do the hard work of actually choosing from the menu. And hard it really was – we were seriously (and I mean seriously) considering ordering everything. Maybe it was just the prosecco talking but everything on the menu sounded incredibly yum.

In the end we erred on the side of sense and ordered a respectable 7 dishes (not including dessert of course!):

Vadai – dhal fritters with a green chilli and tamarind sauce
This for me was the most disappointing dish. While the fritters were on an uphill battle long before we got to tasting them (we ordered based on what the table next to us were getting, they were not having the dhal fritters as it turns out), but these falafel-like rounds of dhal were a little lacklustre in taste and the sauce didn’t have as much zing as anticipated.

Polenta chips with gorgonzola dipping sauce
These little gems of goodness were golden and crispy on the outside, fluffy and white on the inside – McCain oven-baked chips were well and truly put to shame. The gorgonzola cheese sauce I approached with some trepidation - I do not like blue cheese as a general rule (this same rule applies to pâté but more about that later) - only to be pleasantly and quite rightly proved wrong. This sauce was a lovely balance of creaminess and sharp saltiness and I was lucky enough to score the honours of wiping the little ramekin completely clean of any cheese sauce remnants with the last polenta chip.

Charcuterie plate
This share plate came piled with Italian bresaola – flavour-full, deep crimson-coloured air-cured beef, cornichons, wafer-thin strips of Spanish jamón, salami, pickled vegetables, toasted sourdough and duck liver pâté, which I ate, and quite liked. Taken with some cornichons, jamón on toast and a bit of white wine and we can count each other a bit more solidly in the friend department.

Salt cod brandade – salt cod on toast with quinoa, fennel and olive oil emulsion
Stand out, over all winner of the night – the salt cod very quickly won over all our hearts and is now our very best friend. At least it will be when we’re next hungover as this, we’ve discovered, is the perfect dish to have the day after the night before. Basically this dish is little salt cod toasts with a grey-green sauce (emulsion, our waiter corrected before Flying Carpet and I could embarrass ourselves further) of fish sauce, salt and olive oil with crunchy fennel and tiny little quinoa grains mixed in for good measure. Lovely, salty, not too fishy, textured and all round delicious. Highly recommend it – we’ll be going back for more.

Cuttlefish salad – pan seared cuttlefish with a red cabbage, chilli, aubergine and potato chip salad
Now I thought this was a great dish. Since that night I have had it that Slow Loris didn’t really think this was particularly interesting or flavoursome. I liked the way there was gentle heat from the chilli, crunch from the (plain, salted) potato chips and red cabbage (a little more cooked than raw) and the aubergine and pan seared cuttlefish (or maybe it was baked?) were a good combination. Admittedly not as ‘wow’ as the salt cod but not disagreeable either.

Socca – chickpea pancake with feta, roast pumpkin and dill
By now we’re onto our second bottle of white wine the first was the 2009 Kilikanoon Morts Block Riesling from the Clare Valley and our second…actually I have no idea what our second bottle was. It was white, dry and went down pretty well. Maybe one of the TEA Club can fill in for me – perhaps Wheels who the waiter figured out pretty quickly was the ‘matriarch’ of our little ensemble (her words, not mine).
Anyway, the chickpea pancake was another winner – nutty flavour, good thickness, worked wonders with the roast pumpkin, feta and dill in our mouths. Who would have thought dill with pumpkin? I’m usually a bit boring and tend to use flat-leaf parsley or maybe some oregano with my pumpkin and feta pizzas. I tremendously enjoyed the flavour of this little snack-sized dish.

Lamb –milk fed lamb, black bean purée, French beans, fennel, potato
The lamb was cooked to perfection.  Yes it’s a bit sad that a particularly little lamb – one still feeding on ewe’s milk - gave it’s short life for my dinner but I really like lamb. Especially this lamb, smothered in a black bean sauce with crisp French beans, small medallions of starchy potato and roasted fennel. My mouth is watering, again. This was the only ‘main’ sized dish we ordered (we like to graze), but I would probably struggle to have this on my own. Doubtful that I would ever be having dinner with someone that wouldn’t offer to finish it for me – but worth the extra dosh.

For dessert we chose two to share – the trifle of strawberries, cream, champagne jelly and biscuits and the apple crumble, watered down with a glass of Pedro Ximenez sherry, each.

Each element of the trifle worked individually (I would have gladly taken a bowl of that jelly on its own) but also in combination served up in a reidel glass of goodness. I have had those glasses on my wish list for ages! And what better way to showcase them than with a scrumptious dessert.

The apple crumble was more like a tarte tatin with lovely cinnamon spiced apples and toasted almond flake crumble sprinkled on top and a dollop of crème fraiche. Very delicious and perfect for winter.

Overall, Bloodwood and its food were brilliant - different and interesting enough to set the experience apart from your local ‘mod Oz’ type of place but blasé in an easy, comfortable, ‘I know I’m cool’ kind of way that makes you happy to head there for a few relaxed drinks and grazing plates without dressing up for the occasion. The service was impeccable to the point of eavesdropping on our entire conversation, our suave waiter catching out Slow Loris as he poured himself a second glass of wine despite the full one in front of him, and friendly to boot.

The menu came across as being an eclectic mix of what the chefs wanted to cook and what they like to eat, rather than what they think makes a good menu and will get attention. And I’d say all of us very much like to eat it too.

If you’re ever nearby:
Bloodwood
416 King St
+61 2 9557 7699

PS Apologies for the poor lighting and quality of the photos – drinking and taking photos don’t necessitate good material for blogging. [I will put up more soon!]