The stakes are high at Hearth with expectations resting both on a storied brand – as the signature restaurant of The Ritz-Carlton – and also Executive Chef, Jed Gerrard. In his tenure at Wildflower (at nearby COMO The Treasury) there was a zeal in aligning the menu with the Noongar seasonal calendar, and a formality in service that hasn’t always sat well with me. The question: is Hearth the same again?

 A seamless welcome eases me into a flawless dining experience; a tough ask anywhere, and in particular Perth. It’s warm and convivial, questions are answered, and when a server doesn’t have everything they need they fall back on the kitchen or a somm.

 My Lithuanian host warmly smiles, as she guides me to a prime spot looking outward over Elizabeth Quay, a development that with the opening of The Ritz-Carlton is starting to make sense; finding it’s place in what is a new face of Perth. She’s not thrown when I ask to take the inward facing seat, with an eye over the calming blues and marble of the restrained interior, and to the open portion of the kitchen, the eponymous Hearth throwing flame as chefs methodically do their thing.

 It’s been a constant, almost whisper, from chefs in the past 12 months that Gerrard has had the year to prepare for the opening. It’s a luxury many will never have: time and the resources of The Ritz-Carlton to travel the state engaging with producers, and developing a menu that delivers. A luxury but with it pressure.

The journey is evident in the menu, and on its reverse, a map of the state highlights produce both indigenous and not from Ravensthorpe in the far south east to Kununurra in the north. Restaurants like Hearth matter. They’re a showcase for not just a hotel or a city, but a state and it’s food scene; especially its premium producers. It can be a defining memory that travels with the diner.

I’m in for lunch. The menu is a pared down choice of dinner dishes but no less interesting. Spent grain bread rolls are served with native thyme butter; a break from the smoked butter shtick that seems to pervade fine dining. It’s the first hint that while the hearth is central to the restaurant, each dish having met with some element of flame, it’s not laboured at the expense of lightness.

A sour, set goats milk quivers on the plate alongside pickled and raw Arthur River youlk (a native root vegetable), a puff of dry ice wisps up from the bowl. Cool and refreshing (it’s 41c outside), it plays perfectly with nasturtium and dill.  That lightness of touch again with a rainbow trout only gently licked with Jarrah smoke. Burnt butter brings a rich depth that takes the edge off a sour sorrel cream, but that trout, from Southern Forests producer Blue Ridge Marron, is the undoubted star.

The wine list is worthy of high praise; focused on but not exclusively of Western Australia. Parochialism isn’t a requirement here. The by the bottle list is strong, and the honed by the glass offering won’t leave you disappointed.

A beef tartare, always a go-to for me, is beautifully constructed with diced striploin from Blackwood Valley Beef forming a base, a thin disc of coal baked beetroot on top and crowned with a tangle of fried beetroot noodles, garnished with salt cured yolk and flowering wasabi.

 Dhufish is a star turn on the mains. Gerrard tells me it’s line caught by the crew of the F.V Bowithick off the Abrolhos Islands; Skipper Ben Pethick, drawing praise for his methods from both chefs and fishery insiders alike. While it’sa compelling story in the capture, it’s equally strong on the plate. Skewered and hung vertically on the side of the charcoal hearth, it’s got all the benefit of smoke and miso: glazed before and after cooking. A better dhufish I don’t think I’ve tasted, the dish brought together with well-roasted cauliflower, crisp from the fire and a deep smoked bone sauce. A lightly grilled gooseberry dessert serves as the ideal full stop.

My Lithuanian host is back at the table, asking, I assume of both front and back of house, “did they dance around you.” It could perhaps be lost in translation but makes perfect sense. Hearth is as finely a choreographed dining experience as you’ll find in Western Australia right now. Time to pencil it into your dance card.