Grazing Express Post

Entrees~ starting top left clockwise (all entrees $17.00)

Smoked Rainbow trout croquette with artichoke, burnt leek and parsley picada.

Pork belly 18hr slow cooked pork belly with braise carrot, soubise, apple and prune. This was by far the best entrée, the sweetness went well with the salt of the seasoned protein and the pork belly itself was cooked very well.

Tuna olive oil rare poached Yellowfin tuna with crisp octopus, chorizo and cauliflower. This was the one I chose, but I didn’t like the texture of the tuna, the octopus tasted to ‘charred’ for me and I found all the components very disjointed from each other.

Asparagus manchego custards with almost crunch, shaved raw asparagus, broccolini and green pea.

Mains~ starting top left clockwise (all mains $33.00)

Ox cheek braised in Pedro Ximenez sherry with glazed heirloom carrots, horseradish and parsnip puree. This was my pick of the mains. It is a heavy comforting style kind of dish and the stickiness of the sauce paired perfectly with the naturally sweet vegetables.

Beetroot and lentil salad roast baby beetroot and fine green lentil salad with goat’s cheese fritter and garden herbs. My friend ordered this entree as a her main meal

Chicken free range chicken breast with bacon marmalade, radish, zucchini and roquette sauce. Is it wrong of me to order a dish based on the fact that it had bacon marmalade? Yes, apparently it was. I didn’t really enjoy my dish despite the chicken being cooked to perfection while being kept moist. The roquette sauce was waaaaay too over powering and the skin was really salty but the vegetables were pure, fresh and simple.

Fish baked ocean trout loin with grains, salsa verde and red wine trout jus.Desserts~ starting top left clockwise (all mains $33.00)

Mousse white and dark chocolate mousse with seasonal berries, garden fruits, almond milk sorbet and toasted milk crumbs.

Caramel salted hazelnut frozen caramel and salted hazelnut with chocolate parfait, chocolate aero and pastry tidbits. A mixture of easy to please kind of dish but I didn’t find anything exciting about this at all.

Orange flourless orange cake with fennel and coffee ‘dukkah’, orange butter and marmalade ice cream. I would have ordered this dessert for the marmalade ice cream itself, it was AMAZING. It was just lucky that every other aspect of this dish was brilliant too.

Tira mi su classic Italian dessert made with rum flavoured Italian cream cheese, espresso granita, fig and chocolate biscotti. The coffee was so intense, we could not finish it and that is coming from me who is a huge tiramisu fan. p.s. Don’t forget to use your Entertainment voucher!

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Oh me oh my!

I’ve been spoilt this weekend with food choices.
First I started off with a sneak peek at the night noodle markets and today I’ve been off celebrating birthdays. We had long lunch at Grazing and then dinner not long afterwards at Pistachio. Now to sit in my pjs and pat my belly.

Grazing

——-22/10/2011——-

You know I’ll go anywhere for food when I start heading interstate just for dinner.  

When my lovely friends asked me if I’d like to join them at Grazing, I jumped at the chance as I have been wanting to go for quite some time (and it had been way too long since I had last seen them). While driving through the quaint town of Gundaroo, I was intrigued by the little town, so much so that I would love to go back during the day for a browse.

The rustic charm of the building surrounded by gorgeous flowers and vines.

After bounding around from room to room to check out all the other spaces within the restaurant (I like all the different colours, multiple fireplaces and artworks in each room), I finally sat down to study the menu.

Bread-  fresh baked light rye bread with La Barre blood plum finishing vinegar and Yass olive oil ($2.00 each)

Entrees ($17.00)

Prawns- pancetta rolled prawns, white bean custard, apple slaw and parsley mayonnaise. My eyes widen as I was eating the white bean custard, I love it so much that I had to check the menu again to see what it was. Yum!

Roulade- duck and veal roulade wrapped in Kyeema vince leaves with smoked potato mousse and eggplant.

Olive raviolo- herbed pasta filled with ricotta, mixed olives and semi dried tomatoes, with wilted spinach, chives & browned butter lemon sauce.

Mains ($33.00)

Lamb- lamb cutlets and slow cooked lamb shoulder with stinging nettle, minted potatoes and spring peas, with confit tomato hollandaise. It was a weird feeling to eat stinging nettle and there is no proper way to describe it but that it melted in your mouth. And the lamb? Oh so delicious! Spectacular!

Beef- grass fed beef fillet with mustard, spinach, broad bean and tarragon crush and potato salad. I didn’t take any ‘after’ shots as there was nothing left but a little bit of sauce left on the plate. If I wasn’t with company (or surrounded by witnesses) I may have licked the plate. Amazing tender beef.

Barramundi- farmed barramundi with squid ink pasta ribbons, La Barre olive oil poached black olives, capers and wild caught octopus. Lucky for me, my friend doesn’t eat octopus, so between mouthfuls of tender beef, I had bites of soft non chewy fresh octopus. 

Desserts ($16.00)

Bavorois- delicate buttermilk bavarois with strawberries, pink peppercorn meringue, blood orange segments and consomme. I’ve eaten a lot of desserts in my time, but never one floating in a consomme (how fancy!). The bavorois was very very creamy, not too much in the way of taste but the consomme made up for that.

Bread and butter pudding– rum and raisin soaked bread and butter pudding with candied walnut ice-cream and sherry poached grapes. I didn’t get to try this as I was too busy munching into my own dessert but when I looked up the plate was empty so it must have been good!

Chocolate- baked chocolate fudge terrine with frosted blueberries, espresso marshmallow and pine nut flavoured ice-cream. I was going to get this, but the mere description of a chocolate terrine made me savour for ham. Surprisingly it wasn’t too sweet and it was so delectable I almost finished off my friend’s dessert after finishing my own.  I would definitely order this next time.

This painting made me giggle.

After such a fabulous dinner with delicious food (and splendid company) where you can taste the freshness of the produce, I can easily see how this made the top 20 restaurants in the area. The staff were very friendly, attentive and knowledgeable.

I couldn’t figure out for the life of me why there were so few people in the dining room on a Saturday night when it was such an awesome restaurant, until finally when I went to the bathroom. It was beyond a door that lead to an adjoining function room where loud music was playing for a lovely wedding reception. Ooooh… That’s where all the people are.

I would love to come back out here again to try more things on the menu and maybe even come back and do a few repeats if the menu is the same.

Venue: Grazing

Address: Cork Street, Gundaroo, NSW 2620

Opening hours:     Lunch Fri- Sun and most public holidays

                                      Dinner Thurs- Sat

Phone: (02) 62368777

Entertainment book: Yes, on the gold card! Bargain!

Website: http://www.grazing.com.au/