Est. showcases the best of Sydney grand dining, with white surrounds, Grecian-style columns and sparkling chandeliers; proof that there’s still a place for fluttering double-linen and elegant eats in this city.

Eager staff float in crisp uniforms, ready to shuffle away plates and ensure glasses are filled. All around, tables are having a good time, enquiring after the house prosecco but upgrading to the Ruinart Blanc when the Champagne trolley is brought over.

Match that Champagne with a ring of picked crab adorned with transparent ribbons of kohlrabi and chive blossoms. At the table, the waiter pours buttermilk and dill oil into the centre. There’s a hit of Japanese yuzu kosho; a lovely citrus kick with all the heat of a sumo wrestler’s grasp. It’s delicious, frankly you’re hard pressed not to lick the plate.

House-made agnolotti pasta pillows are filled with buttery potato; so smooth it’s like eating the impending dessert soufflé. They wade in a white beer and braised onion sauce with clams and their cooking butter, and the entire plate is draped in slivers of fatty guanciale and pretty fresh pops of coastal greens.

Peter Doyle hung up his apron in June to lead Merivale’s new apprentice program, handing the reins to Jacob Davey. And although Doyle’s classic dishes have largely disappeared from the menu, his sweet but pitch-perfect passionfruit soufflé with passionfruit sorbet clings on with its airy grace. There’s still an inventiveness to the menu, but the familiar French-style sauces are more daring, turned Japanese or given a kick of heat. The excellence is perhaps not quite so straight-shooting under Davey’s watch.  

Must eat dish: hand-picked crab, kohlrabi, yuzu kosho, chive blossoms, buttermilk, dill oil