Food: 4 stars
Service: 4.5 stars
Ambience: 4.5 stars
There has been quite a buzz around the office for Nomad Wine in Sydney so I decided to check it out during my first day in the beautiful city. My hotel was near the Sydney Opera House. Nomad Wine was on the other side of town in Surry Hills. My colleagues and I decided to walk to the restaurant. It took about 25 minutes but helped us work up an appetite. It was a lovely autumn’s evening and the hike was literally a walk in a park – Hyde Park.
I love creative people – musicians, artists, designers… you name it. Upon arriving at Nomad, I was impressed by the ‘upmarket casual’ look of the place. The journey began even outside the front door of the restaurant, where I had to do a double-take of the restaurant sign/logo. The spacing between the alphabets were off and the blank space in between was embossed. Interesting, I thought.
It was obvious that Nomad Wine had the right pitch to their target market because the restaurant filled up very quickly. From the Small Plates, we ordered some Sydney rock oysters , Zucchini flowers – pecorino, truffle honey and Duck & pork rillets – pickled cherry, brioche. The zucchini flowers were beautifully crisp and sweet and the freshly baked brioche loaf for the rillets was a very nice touch. From the Grill & Woodfired Oven, we ordered Skull Island tiger prawns with saffron butter, Rangers Valley Hanger with grilled cucumber and black garlic and the Wood roasted suckling pig. From the Garden we ordered Spiced cauliflower with cashew and wild rocket. Every dish was well executed with big flavours. The only downside was that many of the dishes were too well salted, one of them were so salty that we could not finish the dish. I gave the feedback to the attentive waiter, who kindly took that dish off the bill and offered us a free dessert.
I had a really good evening in the restaurant watching the world go by and observed the well dressed Sydney-ians. I don’t know if there is a word for people from Sydney. Please let me know if you do.