Italian with a twist: Steak in white chocolate

These first-time restaurateurs who’ve opened in a newly renovated historic building in Fortitude Valley are not bothering to play it safe.

Alison Walsh

@AlisonAWalsh

3 min read

August 26, 2021 - 4:00PM

QWeekend

Don't miss out on the headlines from QWeekend. Followed categories will be added to My News.

Steak aged in white chocolate? Rabbit ragu pasta topped with a light dusting of ground coffee? Cheesecake with rosemary ice-cream and miso sable crumble?

The first-time restaurateurs who’ve opened in a newly renovated historic building in Fortitude Valley during the depths of a pandemic are not bothering to play it safe.

Bring it on, the menu shouts! And the drinks side of the operation is equally attention grabbing. There’s a multi-page, bound cocktail and spirits menu (four versions of negroni kick off proceedings) and a lengthy global wine list that displays a particular interest in Italy and specifically, Sicily.

Rosmarino owners Lauren Smith and Milan Michelin-trained sommelier Andrea Gatti, who most recently were working at Hellenika in James St, have teamed up with Italian chef Dario Manca (ex-Za Za Ta, Fortitude Valley) for the enterprise.

The restaurant, with a wine bar at the front of a long, narrow dining room that opens to a small courtyard, is part of a heritage building that opened as clothing manufacturer Stewart & Hemmant in 1898, and has now undergone an extreme makeover from its various iterations including a stint as the Great Wall Shopping Centre.

Original brick walls team with polished concrete floors, wooden tables, framed European maps and dangling lights to create a darkly elegant space on the McLachlan St side of the retail and office complex.

Inside Rosmarino restaurant. Picture: David Kelly

Beef tartare and kingfish crudo with burnt buttermilk are among the antipasti options but we move on to Manca’s signature culurgiones ($25), artfully pleated traditional Sardinian pasta pockets stuffed with a soft, smooth filling of potato.

They’re a treat but even more memorable is a bowl of house-made short pasta twists bathed in a rabbit ragu ($27), with shallot, goat curd, lemon thyme and white wine and a crowning sprinkle of coffee adding a final complementary touch in the flavour arsenal.

The signature culurgiones. Picture: David Kelly

The menu lays out the time involved in the main courses: rolled lamb belly cooked for 24 hours; seven-day aged duck and the beef ($54), in this case, tri-tip with a 9-plus marbling score, ages for up to seven days in white chocolate.

The resulting slices of meat are soft and meltingly delicious, with a slight caramel note but there’s no particularly obvious chocolate presence.

Showcased simply with a small pond of garlic and anchovy-heavy bagna cauda sauce, a hillock of finely diced rockmelon and red wine jus, it’s pretty amazing.

No vegetables are included but a side of thrice-cooked potatoes ($12) proves a winner, the spuds flaunting a crispy exterior with almost impossibly fluffy insides.

Rosmarino restaurant, the steak al cioccolato dish. Picture: David Kelly

Something of a letdown in comparison is the restrained flavour of the cured and smoked rainbow trout ($39) paddling in a brothy acqua pazza sauce in a smallish bowl with a wide brim.

Desserts are similarly contrasting, with macinamisu ($18), a version of tiramisu using shortcrust biscuits rather than savoiardi, featuring a rather overwhelming ratio of coffee pastry cream, mascarpone and zabaione.

Another dessert stars a pear perfectly poached in chenin blanc with a sheep milk yoghurt and white chocolate ganache and excellently tangy vanilla fior di latte ice-cream ($18), although the cookie dough crumble is almost a step too far. A selection of nine types of cheese is also on offer.

Inside Rosmarino restaurant. Picture: David Kelly

The wine bar at the front operates simultaneously for walk-ins, with a menu of salumi, 20 cheeses, snacks such as chickpea waffles, toasted sandwiches and several types of house-made bread, which curiously is also on the restaurant’s degustation menus but not offered to a la carte diners.

That seems a crying shame given the fat, crusty sourdough loaves I could see being shovelled out of the oven.

Service is attentive and the final winning ingredient in a dinner where culinary quirkiness has nothing to do with seeking attention and is all about delivering sheer deliciousness on
a plate.