The Mouth: Is Surry Hills pub The White Horse Sydney’s this year’s most surprising new restaurant?

A Surry Hills bar has just reopened itself as no mere gastropub. The White Horse is setting the pace as an honest-to-God fine diner.

The White Horse in Surry Hills. Picture: Savannah PR

Anyone who has kicked around Sydney long enough has probably thought at one time or another: “If only I’d bought in to such-and-such a suburb when it was a dump.”

Take Surry Hills. Once a storeyed slum – see Ruth Park’s The Harp in the South, for example – the average house price, often for something so narrow residents have to walk through the thing sideways, sits somewhere north of $2.2 million.

And where once it hosted divey if not downright sketchy pubs, pretty much everything along Crown has been gentrified within an inch of its life.

The last of these dominoes to fall, the White Horse, just reopened itself as no mere gastropub but what can only be described as an honest to God fine diner.

And, gosh, wow.

The new look The White Horse in Surry Hills. Photo supplied by Savannah PR

All soft light, textured walls, and warm art, the fit out would not be out of place in New York or London. Thank God they eschewed the usual $3 million worth of bistro brass.

They also hit the details right: Perceval knives from Thiers in France, for example, ain’t cheap, but they are perfectly balanced, elegant, we want a set for our next birthday.

The Mouth's visit to The White Horse. Picture: Supplied

The star of The Mouth’s dining experience was the Royal blue potato, black garlic, white onion, mustard seeds. Picture: Supplied

Exec chef Jed Gerrard is turning out a really interesting menu of really creative Aussie-Euro-ish dishes.

On a recent visit we scarfed a dozen plump little rock oysters with horseradish a red onion mignotte, and some crispy bits of chicken skin topped with a bright light-touch liver mousse lifted by Davidson plum.

Also good to see the underrated tri tip steak on the menu, though we thought a plate of duck was perfectly cooked but slightly overwhelmed by sharp rhubarb and native fruits.

The big star side though, and something for which this place will surely become famous, is a sort of cake of sliced royal blue potato topped with a cheesy onion sauce and black garlic.

The rooftop bar at The White Horse. Photo supplied by Savannah PR

“They really lean into the flavour here,” our mate commented.

The wine list is also fascinating, with a lot of off-piste bottles, though for some reason we ordered a German pinot noir, which was about as weird an experience as reading a German romance novel.

Our fault, not theirs, and while it ain’t cheap, they’ve also kept prices in the reasonable range.

Unlike local terraces.