The top dish served with ants … yes, ants
A celebrated chef born in El Salvador is creating a new style of contemporary Australian cuisine peppered with indigenous produce including ants (yes, you heard right) – and it promises to change dining in this Brisbane suburb.
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STEPPING inside The Wolfe is bit like stepping into an art gallery. And I’m guessing that’s just how chef Josue “Josh” Lopez and his artistic wife Krystal planned it.
It fits with the chef’s food-is-art mantra, which he developed as executive chef at the Gallery of Modern Art.
Once through the doors at The Wolfe you quickly leave the grimy streets of East Brisbane behind. Large moody pictures in blacks and greys dominate the walls. There is a dark grey carpet and an atmosphere of quiet, understated elegance.
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Behind the decoration there is a quiet revolution going on in the kitchen where the chef, who was born in El Salvador, is creating a new variety of contemporary Australian cuisine peppered with indigenous produce.
We choose the mini-degustation of four courses for $90. Add $55 for wine parings or $75 for premium wine parings, or drink wine by the glass, as we did.
A roasted quail dish arrives with its claw rising from the plate.
The succulent little bird appears to be hiding under a blanket of spinach leaves in a “sauce” featuring berries and ants.
Ants are rather commonplace in indigenous cooking nowadays, and they provide a cleansing burst of acid that pairs well with the berries.
This explains why the dish is headlined “Wet my lips”.
A dish provocatively entitled “Father and son” is a rectangle of bloody Wagyu beef juxtaposed with a portion of baby veal and served with beetroot and blackberries over brassicas. It is a terrific combination from a talented chef.
Lopez once worked at Rene Redzepi’s acclaimed Noma restaurant in Copenhagen where chefs go on foraging expeditions for wild regional ingredients.
In an interview he said it was an experience that opened his eyes to the possibilities of true regional cooking. Sometimes it all backfires.
In an especially “creative” mood he once combined snapper and scallops and sat them atop a strawberry risotto. It was a disaster.
Another bemusing and flavoursome dish is entitled “Expedition” and features camel milk cheese with quandong, saltbush and lucerne.
Two questions arise: Isn’t lucerne cattle food? And how do you milk a camel? The sorghum arrives as a kind of puffed popcorn for a crunchy riff. Every dish is presented as a story waiting to be told.
“Ocean floor” speaks of the outstanding Queensland produce like NQ crayfish, scallops and octopus with tiny wild citrus bullets courtesy of finger limes.
The wine list is not a massive one but it has some interesting vintages, many from smaller producers.
Pleasingly it contains a number of wines by the glass from top Queensland vintners including Witches Falls and Golden Grove.
The blonde devours a glass of Louis Roederer NV champagne ($25) while I drink water followed by a glass of Amato Vino Nebbiolo 2017 ($18) from the Margaret River in Western Australia.
Lopez comes to The Wolfe with a big reputation but you can’t eat reputations. Mostly he delivers. I think the “Monstera” pudding, however, is a dud.
It is a mix of tropical fruits and pandan-flavoured coconut but has a weird, gluey mouthfeel and not much flavour to compensate.
Still, The Wolfe has the potential to be one of the best suburban restaurants in the capital.
THE WOLFE
989 Stanley St, East Brisbane
BOOK
07 3891 7772
enquiries@thewolfeeastbrisbane.com.au
OPEN
Lunch - Thursday and Friday noon-3pm
Dinner - Tuesday to Saturday, 6pm-late
MUST TRY “father and son”
VERDICT
Food 8
Ambience 8
Value 7
Service 8
OVERALL 8/10
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