Author: Alex

Grace Est

- Alex 2 Comments

photos by Damien Seidel*

date of visit: Sunday 1 April 2012

It’s taken me a very long time to get to Grace, which I think is excusable since I live a reasonable distance from Norwood. So I know this review is about a year off being cutting edge …

When I booked (for midday, on the dot of opening) I was told that the restaurant was hosting a function at 1:30pm and we’d need to be finished lunch by then. Not a problem – I only take issue with this kind of thing if the venue waits until I turn up to tell me I need to clear my table at a certain time.

On arrival, it turned out that due to the function we were the ONLY table in the restaurant so our experience is probably not representative.

Grace is divided into three areas: a bar, the very black and white restaurant and the beer garden. In the restaurant you can quite comfortably spy on what is going on in other parts of the venue, so it’s optimal for people watching.

At first, service was reasonably attentive but that definitely dropped off as our lunch went on. One of my friends described the staff as having a ‘morning after’ feel and either they had indeed had a big night on Saturday or they were woefully understaffed. Let’s be charitable and say understaffed.

We started with a bottle of Oliver’s Taranga Fiano and should have got straight to work on the menu except that one person discovered some suspect floaty bits in her glass of wine. As the wine is under screwcap cork couldn’t be the culprit and, as the Fiano wasn’t available by the glass, she ended up having it replaced (on the house) with a glass of Riesling. This was all handled well enough but I do think that making the effort to check glassware is clean should be a really basic part of keeping a restaurant …

Food wise, our entrées were two lots of steak tartare, one kingfish ceviche and one chorizo and chilli. The entrées were generally well received – the steak tartare was excellent. Hand chopped steak, not too fine, beautifully presented – although with a decent piece of meat this should be a dish which is relatively difficult to stuff up! The kingfish ceviche got a big thumbs up (and was even more pretty on the plate) although the comment was made that it would have been nice to know whether or not the kingfish is local. The chorizo and peppers was less of a hit: the peppers apparently were mostly underwhelming and a rather large number were left on the plate. The waitress informed us that about 1 in 20 is really hot: probably not the surprise you’re after if you don’t like hot food …

For main course we showed a great lack of imagination with THREE people ordering the salmon with pea puree and heirloom tomato salad. Comments on this different wildly: bland, salmon perfectly cooked, salmon overcooked. Make of this what you will! I ordered the slow cooked pork belly with daikon, heirloom carrots and Japanese mayonnaise. The pork was excellent (with a lovely expanse of crackling) and the daikon made an excellent counterfoil to the meat’s richnesss and fattiness. However, the carrots were utterly undercooked. To the point that they were almost, but not quite, raw. I can only imagine that someone forgot to the put the carrots on and there was a mad rush to get them on the plate – in which case I would have just preferred them raw! The final main was the jerk chicken which got the seal of approval. Two cuts of meat: one on, one off the bone, served with white beans and tomato. Apparently this was beautiful.

Some of us wrapped up with desserts where the hit of the day was the peanut butter and jelly icecream sandwich. That actually sounds pretty horrible to me, but apparently it was good enough to warrant a trip back just to eat that one dish alone. The apple pies didn’t quite receive such accolades but there were no complaints.

So food wise, Grace ticks some boxes – I’d go back and eat there, as would at least a couple of my dining companions. Some people may find that they require two courses: portions aren’t massive but I’d describe them as sufficient (I had entrée and main and only needed a cheese toastie for my dinner).

But service wise – they really need to get some more staff on and get some MUCH better communicating happening. When our entrées arrived, we waited a good 5 minutes for the final dish (the chorizo) to arrive – we actually had to ask after it. Taking of our dessert and coffee orders was slow – although nowhere near as slow as getting hold of the bill!

The real disappointment was the way in which the whole function thing was handled. We knew we had to clear the table by 1:30pm and, aware of the time, I actually asked a staff member if she would like us to move to the bar or garden for dessert and coffees. She insisted that wasn’t necessary but it was subsequently quite obvious that other staff members were getting grief from the function (which is reasonable – if you’re paying for use of an area you don’t wand random lunchers hanging around!) and all starting to look a bit harried.

So – while Grace serves up some good, and beautifully presented food, it can be a touch uneven. But where it really needs to pull its socks up is its service and attention to detail. Clean plates, cutlery and glasses should be de rigueur and communication between sufficient staff makes for a stress free experience for everyone.

While I would be happy to go back, I’d be cautious about a blanket recommendation of the restaurant – especially if you are a pedant when it comes to service. Caveat emptor.

* I don’t normally take photographs of food in restaurants – I think it’s inconsiderate to both my companions and other diners.  Because we were the only people in the restaurant, and the food was so pretty, these are very much the exception to that rule.

Grace The Establishment on Urbanspoon

Cheeky Drop’s Friday Drinks

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Red SquirrelRed Squirrel by Sergey Yeliseev

Disclaimer: the nice squirrels at Cheeky Drop are providing Eating Adelaide with some Friday drinks of its own.

You would imagine that Friday drinks are something of an institution but I bet many readers are out there who have never worked anywhere where Friday drinks are on the boss. There’s a massive number of reasons for this: obviously someone in accounts has to open the corporate wallet but bosses also have to be mindful of responsible consumption. Yep – some people still think it’s OK to drink and drive (especially if someone else is paying) and then unfortunately you always get the few people who exploit the boss’s generosity, have too many drinks and then behave like idiots. As with the schoolyard, there’s very often just the one person who spoils it for everyone.

I’ve been very lucky. Quite a few of my employers (including my current one) have laid on drinks on some form or another. One place had very casual team based drinks every Friday (I kid you not) and then on a regular basis had a bigger, catered events for the whole company. Currently, I can enjoy a few free drinks on the first Friday of the month. When I lived in England, free drinks on any kind of regular basis were thin on the ground – but that might have been because everyone was more than happy to go to the pub and pay for their own! But that didn’t stop employers putting on very impressive Christmas dos and putting on things like beer and pizza on Christmas Eve. And when I say “Christmas Eve” I mean 10am.

Personally, I’m in favour of Friday drinks – it’s lovely to socialise with colleagues and I suspect bosses are secretly pleased with the amount of work chat that goes on! I’ve never been to a works drinks where everyone hasn’t been catered for – I enjoy my work functions just as much when holding a glass of water or orange juice as I do when holding a beer.

Anyway, enough about me because this is actually all about you and how you and your colleagues can treat yourselves to Friday drinks. And not just any Friday drinks … but Friday drinks delivered by a squirrel*. The squirrel will turn up with a case of wine and all you have to do is enjoy yourselves.

Of course, you do have to put some effort in here. You need to tell the squirrels why you need the drinks, you need a bit of facebook or twitter action (and while you’re over at facebook don’t forget to like Eating Adelaide). The competition is open now and a winner is going to be drawn every Wednesday (so delivery can be arranged in time for Friday) until 30 May. The first winner is drawn next Wednesday 18 April.

Full details can be found over at Cheeky Drop. Get entering!

* Note that the squirrel is a person in costume, but I have been assured that that is what you will get!

Chettinad Fried Chicken

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There is a restaurant review in the works but today I’m running short of time so here is an excellent chicken recipe that you might find useful over the long break. This is an Indian recipe (Chettinad is a region in Tamil Nadu, in southern India) but it’s a really welcome change to a big saucy curry. It stands on its own perfectly well, but if you are putting together a curry extravaganza, then this is a pleasant contrast to sauce rich dishes. It’s also fab because it doesn’t require 3000 different spices, carefully roasted and ground.

I got this recipe from my mum and I’m pretty sure it did originally come out of a cookbook – I’m sure she’ll let us all know which one!

Begin by taking about 1kg of chicken (I use skinned thigh fillets cut into large cubes) and rub it with about 1 tsp of salt and a generous sprinkle of turmeric. Set aside.

Prepare some salted water – 3 tbsp of water with ¼ tsp of salt. Ensure the salt dissolves in the water.

Heat some peanut (or other flavourless oil) in a wok and ½ tsp of mustard seeds, ½ tsp of fennel seeds, and 5 whole dried hot red chillis. Keep the chillis whole – this does keep the heat of the dish under control. If you have it, also add 1-2 tablespoons of skinned urad dahl. If you don’t have it – don’t bother seeking it out. You could also add some curry leaves.

When the spices are crackling and starting to darken add a finely chopped onion and cook until brown (that’s brown – not burnt – don’t get impatient and whack the heat up!).

Add the chicken to the onion and stir fry, sprinkling on some salted water as you go. Keep adding the water. You want to have used up all the water by the time you finish cooking BUT you must sprinkle the water in, so you don’t end up stewing your meat.

It’s best if you can cook the chicken all in one batch but realistically that might not happen. Just be aware that the longer you have the heat on the chillis the more likely they are to start breaking down and the hotter the finished product will become. If you do want to keep some of this dish mild then reserve some cooked chicken from the first batch.

When the chicken is cooked and the salted water is used up, remove the chicken (and onion and spices, of course) from the wok and serve. You don’t need to serve straight away – this dish is perfect to prepare in advance. Once cooked, put everything into an oven proof dish, cover with tin foil and reheat (with the tin foil on) when you are ready to serve.

Best eaten with pappadums, raita, naan … and don’t worry about having too much – there’s very rarely any left over!