Kitchen Confidential: Nota moves into new Montrachet Paddington site

An iconic inner Brisbane dining site is about to score a hot new restaurant from two young guns of the local hospitality scene.

Kevin Docherty and Sebastaiaan de Kor at Nota in Given Terrace. Picture: Attila Csaszar/AAP

PADDINGTON’S iconic Montrachet site is about to score a hot new restaurant from two young guns of the local hospitality scene.

Kevin Docherty of Javier Codina’s beloved Moda, Brisbane and Sebastiaan de Kort from Brisbane’s The Cheese Pleaser are teaming up to open Nota, a relaxed modern European along Given Terrace.

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The two chefs met while working at Moda, and found their styles clicked, recently teaming up for catering functions around Brisbane before deciding to open their first restaurant.

“We’ve been experimenting for the past year or two cooking together for events and we just really want to have fun with (Nota),” de Kort says.

Both classically trained chefs will be in the kitchen of the 50 to 60-seater, creating a relaxed, approachable and affordable produce-driven menu. It will include share-style plates as well as dishes that can be eaten on their own.

“We’re not going to try to reinvent cooking,” de Kort says.

“It will be familiar food, but it’s not the same as what everyone else is doing.”

While the menu is still a work in progress, de Kort says we can expect to see everything from a sandwich to a roast of the day on a Sunday, capitalising on Docherty’s Scottish heritage and building on their plan to become a long lunch destination for family and friends to gather on a Sunday.

Happy Boy’s Cameron Votan is consulting on the wine list, while there will be a strong bar offering with classic cocktails and around five signature mixes using bespoke spirits.

There will also be two beers on tap, and a curated collection of bottled beers from Brisbane brewing expert and occasional Queensland Taste columnist Matt Kirkegaard.

As for the iconic site, it’s getting a mini makeover, de Kort says.

“Structurally we’re not doing anything to it, but we’re making it a bit new,” he says.

“There’ll be exposed brick, we’re going clean black and white with brass... and the red will be gone.”

The plan is to open March 8.

Luke Nguyen at Fat Noodle, Treasury Casino

HELLO VIETNAM

Celebrity chef Luke Nguyen has revealed he is in talks to open an up-market French-Vietnamese restaurant at Brisbane’s upcoming Queen’s Wharf precinct.

The SBS TV personality already has his casual Vietnamese eatery Fat Noodle at Treasury Brisbane and said he’d love to launch a more up-market concept at the new $3.6 billion development, which is scheduled for completion in 2022.

“Fat Noodle is fun, fast, casual eating and I’d like to do something more fine dining without it being fine dining,” he says.

Nguyen says he’s currently considering an offering similar to his Ho Chi Minh City restaurant Vietnam House, which delivers a modern take on classic Vietnamese cuisine.

“I’m not going to do molecular and fusion food or anything like that,” he says.

“It’s about celebrating Vietnamese cuisine and going, ‘This is our cuisine, but let’s use modern cooking techniques to evolve it’.”

The restaurant concept is another thing for the chef to juggle, as he prepares to start filming a new SBS series on Vietnam in March.

The fresh food program will focus on regional cuisine throughout the Asian country and will air either late this year or early next year.

“I start in the north and go from the north to the south of Vietnam taking a train and discovering the local dishes,” Nguyen says.

“I want to dig deep into the culture of it.”

Meanwhile, you can find the small screen star at Treasury Brisbane this Friday and Saturday where he’ll be celebrating Lunar New Year with a series of dinners.

The Friday event at Treasury Hotel Courtyard will offer a street food-style menu, cooking demonstration and meet-and-greet in an outdoor Hawker market vibe; while the Saturday dinner will see Nguyen team up with Kiyomi chef Chase Kojima for a four-course affair with matching wines.

GOODBYE, THANK YOU

Casual South Brisbane Vietnamese eatery Hello Please is on the move.

It’s current site along Fish Lane has been bought, with the new owners vacating all tenants to make way for a fresh development.

Lovers of Hello Please’s fresh salads, rice paper rolls, curries and more won’t have to go far for their fix though, with the shipping container-based restaurant moving just down the street.

Stay tuned for more details.

The Gold Coast is set to get its own taste of Brisbane's Mercado

MERCADO MOVES IN

After wowing Brisbanites with its impressive gourmet offering at Bowen Hills, recently opened luxury providore Mercado is ready to take on the Gold Coast.

The upmarket foodie mecca, which combines a grocer with a bottle shop, fishmonger, fromagerie, patisserie, bakery, butcher and restaurants, will open at Main Beach’s Marina Mirage in a whopping 2100sq m site, 600sq m larger than its Brisbane store.

Based on London’s iconic Harrods Food Hall and Galeries Lafayette in Paris, Mercado is designed as a one-stop-shop for the true foodie, and the new outlet will become the brand’s flagship store.

“Customers have been impressed with the quality, range and prices at our Brisbane operation and we can’t wait to do it all again on an even bigger scale,” Mercado general manager (property) Shaun Dunleavy says.

“Marina Mirage is the perfect location for new flagship premises, which will epitomise our ethos of showcasing food quality and innovation under one exquisite roof.”

But Gold Coast residents will have to wait a while for the gourmet hub, with doors not set to open for at least 12 to 18 months.

BROWNIE BONAZZA

Brisbane southsiders will no longer have to make the trek into the city for Dello Mano’s fab brownies, with the sweet store opening a pop-up at Sunnybank.

Running from this Thursday to Sunday, the store will be at Sunnybank Plaza and feature a Lunar New Year theme with red lanterns, and brownies packaged in red and gold foil.