The one-time steel town is now home to five-star food from two new upmarket luxury hotels.
Strategically edging the ‘fertile crescent’ of the Hunter Valley and once the heart of the state’s steel industry, Newcastle has opened the doors to a new era of eating out. And the contest is on for local hearts and taste buds.
Exactly 12 months ago, Crystalbrook Kingsley opened Newcastle’s first five-star hotel. This month, QT Newcastle, the group’s first regional hotel, opened its doors.
While QT favours darkly sultry interiors, deep rich colours and sexy lighting, Crystalbrook is expansive, silvery and light-filled, with potted olive saplings and wraparound glass walls; two hotels with sophisticated food at the flick of a menu.
Matthew Smith, executive chef at Crystalbrook’s Roundhouse Restaurant – plus rooftop bar Romberg’s and casual deli-lounge Ms Mary – and Massimo Speroni, executive chef at QT Newcastle’s Jana Restaurant & Bar, as well as Rooftop QT, have knives and menus poised and sharpened. Newcastle, between the Pacific and the Hunter, is their fishing field, farm and kitchen garden.
Massimo Speroni, born on Italy’s Adriatic coast, has lived nine years in Australia. Most recently, he comes from the kitchen at Bacchus in Brisbane’s Rydges South Bank hotel. In Newcastle since January, Speroni has been busy tripping around the Hunter, lining up produce for his QT kitchen.
“I love Australia,” he said, “and there are a lot of amazing products, fish, meat, vegetables; they make my job easier.” He’s found “a young couple raising chickens, eggs”, chemical-free and pasture-raised, at Little Hill Farm in the Watagan Mountain foothills; he’s lined up Binnorie Dairy, at Lovedale, for supplies of mascarpone, for desserts (one delicious-sounding dish is ice-cream made with mascarpone); olive oil is sourced from Pukara Estate, and “Pukara also raises lamb”, Speroni said, “which they introduced, at first, to clean the grass under the olive trees”. Now, this grass-fed lamb has its own special flavour, perhaps like European salt-marsh lamb, except with olives.
Speroni comes from one- and two-Michelin-starred restaurants in Italy, but also trattorias; plus influences from Rome, the south and, from his mother’s cooking, the north. He sees QT menus focussed somewhere in the middle, “not too fancy, and not too low”. But definitely not a bland middle-ground. The menu will offer “some things you’ve never seen before”, alongside familiar dishes such as beautiful steaks on the grill (from a premium selection in a dry-aged meat cabinet). The food will be “my style Italian with Australian and Japanese influences”.
Speroni’s menu favourite is a main of hiramasa kingfish served with corn in various guises – pureed, ‘caviar’ – “delicate, soft and fresh … everyone would be pleased to see it”, he said. The South Australian hiramasa kingfish also comes as sashimi, served with dashi to which Speroni adds butterfly pea powder (from the indigo-coloured flowers); “a kind of tea”, sometimes called blue matcha.
Speroni favours Japanese Misono and Glestain chef’s knives, but an unexpected local product features in QT’s private dining room, hand-crafted knives with handles of wood or bone, by Maher, half an hour from Newcastle. “They are one of the best knives I’ve ever seen in my life,” Speroni said, a clue to his mission for QT’s diners.
Across town at Crystalbrook, chef Matthew Smith is seven weeks into the role when we speak. Originally from Cairns, he comes via kitchens that include Absynthe on the Gold Coast and Banksii on Sydney’s Barangaroo waterfront. Banksii and Crystalbrook’s high-end Roundhouse have similar philosophies, Smith said; respect for local and native ingredients, in a modern-style cuisine that is innovative, not dated.
Smith favours local products Pukara Estate lamb and Hunter Valley beef. Fruits and vegetables come from Sydney but here, too, Smith seeks out locals. He has a long-standing relationship with Sydney suppliers, “who are trying to bring locals on board”. His mushrooms now come from Port Stephens on the Hunter coast. His fish supplier, with whom he has daily contact, is sourcing seafood from the Port Stephens area. It’s a challenging time for farmers and producers, Smith said; he wants to grow those links, and with ethically sourced produce.
Indigenous ingredients – such as roasted wattle seeds, which he’ll be serving in a tartare, quandongs, Davidson plums and finger limes – largely from local sources, will spark dishes with underlying flavour that is not masked.
Smith’s cooking is strong on European influences and techniques, with flavours and ideas brought back from travels in Japan. A fish dish is enhanced with citrusy fermented-chilli condiment yuzu kosho. In other dishes, there might be miso flavours. A prawn dish (with prawns from Yamba on the northern NSW coast) comes alive with XO butter, a sauce with simple rich flavours, not overly complicated, but difficult to do at home.
Seafood gives Smith the most satisfaction. Influenced by Sydney chef Josh Niland (who grew up in the Hunter), Smith follows a strict preparation regime, hanging before filleting, cleaning with dry cloths, without water; handling seafood with minimum waste and maximum satisfaction, respect and care.
Kitchen knives at dawn or noodles at high noon, sparks are sparking in Newcastle and diners are winners.
Explore more: crystalbrookcollection.com/kingsley; qtnewcastle.com; visitnewcastle.com.au
