‘Aggressively seasoned’: Brisbane restaurant overdone on one ingredient
It hits the brief for a relaxed place to go for a bite and a drink, but this new Italian eatery from an experienced restaurateur could go easy on one thing.
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When long-time restaurateur Nick Pinn shuttered his elegant suburban bistro Vaquero in Albion, in Brisbane’s inner north, in December after eight years, the likelihood of him starting another hospitality business seemed low.
But the owner of boutique CBD liquor store Malt Traders and its accompanying restaurant Malt Dining just couldn’t quit.
Instead, he took out a lease on the corner of Edward and Mary streets in Brisbane City and went about creating an eatery that nods to both Italy and what Vaquero was admired for – its flame-kissed fare, but in what he describes as a better location.
The result is Osso Bar Italia – a casual, soon-to-be all-day diner serving up antipasti, pizza, pasta and items cooked on the grill, anchored around a dominating central bar made for sipping spritzes and sangiovese.
The restaurant features an alfresco, umbrella-covered deck with high bar tables and stools that would feel quintessentially Italian in the sunshine; but on our visit it is pouring with rain, forcing us inside to the masculine-leaning dining room featuring Sicilian olive-green banquettes and walls, rattan-backed chairs and heavy stone.
With the sky a threatening shade of grey outside, the mood inside is cosy and comfortable, with staff quick to run us through the menu, including daily specials, and seek clarification from the kitchen on dishes they’re unsure of.
That menu is a simple and yet relatively well priced one in this economy.
Guests who are simply there for a snack and a glass of wine from the Italian-heavy, succinct offering are able to choose from the likes of baked oysters, salumi, burrata and kingfish crudo.
While those craving something more substantial can order, say, one of four pizzas, pastas including pumpkin tortellini and pappardelle with lobster, or perhaps beef with a blueberry jus from the grill.
Half the antipasti selection read like sides, so we choose the broccolini ($16) and kipfler potatoes ($16) from the traditional snack section to accompany our mains of beef ragu ($37) and local fish ($42).
But not before we start with some thick slices of focaccia ($6pp) that come drizzled with olive oil, alongside an almost fist-sized quenelle of smoked green olive butter.
The butter is unnecessary and far too generous a portion, with the bread able to stand on its own.
The broccolini arrives with a heavy bitterness, perhaps from the char of the grill, the stems sitting on a slather of labneh and underneath a barrage of chopped pistachios.
Meanwhile, the potatoes come audibly crunchy and golden, but eager for more of the cacio e pepe-inspired sauce on the bottom of the bowl.
Both make a decent accompaniment for what is our dish of the day, the market fish, which on this visit is goldband snapper, cooked until its skin is deeply tanned and crisp and the flesh is firm and flaking.
The fillet is surrounded by a quintet of mussels in their shell and fregola, lacquered in a lemon butter sauce that just holds its consistency while bringing a boost of flavour.
As for the ragu served on tube-shaped calamarata pasta, it’s simple, home-style fare.
All our dishes are aggressively seasoned with salt, and it wouldn’t hurt the kitchen to go a little easier.
Osso Bar Italia is not trying to break the mould for Italian food, but merely offer a relaxed place to go for a bite and a drink.
And with its terrific limoncello spritz from the cocktail list, it hits the brief.
Osso Bar Italia
100 Edward St, Brisbane City
3236 4855
Open
Tue-Sat coffee from 7am, food from 11.30am-late
Must eat
Market fish with mussels and fregola
Verdict - Scores out of 5
Food 3
Service 3.5
Ambience 3.5
Value 3.5
Overall 3.5
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