Ruby Dining restaurant review 2024

A former Cutler and Co chef is pulling out all tricks at his new city restaurant— including a simple snack that’ll change the way you eat flatbread.

Ruby Dining is challenging the idea of a traditional French brasserie — and we’re all for it.

It should have been my first bite, instead was my fifth — and won’t be my last!

As a pro-eater with valuable tummy real estate, you learn the tricks to bypass bread and pack more of everything else in. Even if it kills me. Slabbing butter over warm sourdough is my idea of a good time.

At Ruby, swabbing warm spelt flatbread into a magic potion of olive oil and soy sauce is a close second. Soy? Yep! Play umami peek-a-boo and keep the adventure alive at the city’s new brasserie.

If bread is a window to a restaurant’s soul, chef James Cornwall’s (Cutler and Co, J Sheekey, London) vision is clear.

Spelt flatbreads with a seaweed umami kick and soy? Please. Picture: Jana Langhorst

He’s bending boundaries, rattling tradition. Sure, the European aesthetic dining room awash with dark timber, bentwoods and ruby leather banquettes suggests otherwise, plus a menu piled with cheeseburgers, fries and steak frites with deliciously saucy intermissions is deceptively French.

But Japanese, Italian and broad-brush Asian and Euro flavours all get a turn here, with the devil in Ruby’s detail in the sauce.

Those shiny burgers come alive with a spoon of kasundi ketchup, steak frites proudly lap in a pond of punchy pink peppercorn — and the olive oil- aged soy combo? Pure joy, the surprise salt flavour whacking you into next week.

While Gentleman’s Relish sweetens the deal of an indulgent wagyu bacon skewer ($8 each); a glorious concertina of melt-in-your-mouth pork fat and pickled daikon.

Arguably the sesame seed-studded prawn toast ($6 each) is in its own league and needs no sauce. Whipped prawn meat is domed inside a fried crisp Japanese shokupan bread. Just add lime.

Steak is the main game at Ruby. Picture: Jana Langhorst

Chicken oysters ($6), a coin-sized dark meat behind the chicken thigh, is essentially popcorn chicken hitching a ride on cos lettuce leaf with anchovy and parmesan. A smart, no-brainer snack to fire the tastebuds.

Cornwall has a firm handle on balance, knowing when to harness and hero bold flavours.

His gentle dashi and ginger broth ($24), bobbing with poached calamari, fennel prongs, pickled onion and crunchy turnips, is initially puzzling.

But I’m won over with every fragrant, lime-tickled slurp. I see the pretty dish adds lightness to other gruntier, umami-packed powerhouses in the mix.

Steak is the main event, choose three from the grill starting at $35 to a $90 max. The bavette ($35 for 200g), blushing red tender tiles of Black Onyx Angus flank is cooked to medium rare perfection under a veil of a rich brown sauce, pelted with pink peppercorn spice.

A bonus when the fries hit the pleasure trifecta of hot, crisp and perfectly salted.

While the ricotta pasta parcels ($32) buried under a moss of black truffle, shiitake mushrooms and an equally robust brown butter sauce amps up the indulgence.

Drinks? A solid mix of Aussie and Euro wines, with most bottles living within our under $100 happy place.

Service was switched on and friendly, plates whisked from kitchen and drinks replenished in record time.

Even the madeleines have an unexpected savoury twist. Picture: Jana Langhorst

Dessert? Don’t miss those madeleines ($14 for three) scrumptiously warm with a savoury goats cheese twist. The only thing that erred me about Ruby was the dining room, which lacked an energy and buzz. I also wonder if this was more of a weeknight problem. Those Tay Tay and Top 40 pop anthems didn’t help the vibe.

But hey, Ruby isn’t one to stick to the rules.

Cornwall’s cooking is clever with an excitability and flair, and the true definition of a hidden gem.

I’ll take another flatbread please, don’t skimp on the soy.