Quarter 21 & Becasse in Sydney, NSW

MARK 2011 in your diary as the year Australia's restaurant industry changed forever. Think I'm kidding?

taste becasse

MARK 2011 in your diary as the year Australia's restaurant industry changed forever. Think I'm kidding?

Well, Frank Lowy didn't become the $6-billion man by misreading public sentiment. Fifty years ago, he reshaped retailing via his first shopping centre in Blacktown. Now there are 119 Westfields around the globe. High street strips never quite recovered.

Westfield Sydney's bid to lift eating beyond franchised bland is laudable. Food is no longer just a refuelling pit stop between stores. That said, it takes a brave chef to close a reputable fine diner, downsize and relocate here. You have to admire Justin and Georgia North's chutzpah in opening two restaurants in Westfield Sydney. The new Becasse is an intimate space for just 26 people. The adjacent Quarter 21 tries for bistro, but is far too smart for such humility.

The Norths have created a culinary village in their corner of level five, which includes Becasse bakery, a provedore store and cooking school. Add burger joint, Charlie & Co, in the nearby food court and they've put a lot of free-range eggs in this retail basket.

At this point snobs will declare nothing good can come of a shopping centre setting. They're wrong. Like them or not, these retail cathedrals are the brave new world of dining.

Yes, there are shortcomings (such as a trip to the loo from Quarter 21), but Becasse is like disappearing down Lewis Carroll's rabbit hole to a culinary wonderland. It begins with maitre d' David Jouy guarding a foliage-covered gate, then leading you down a silk tree-lined hall representing the four seasons, ending with winter's bare branches.

This salon-like room with its seven oval tables clad in black ostrich leather and curving, velvety lounge seating, is a splash of fine de si agrcle France. With six staff to pre-empt every need, it is almost overwhelming, although the view to the gym through windows in the sandstone walls is a little unsettling as you contemplate the three-course a la carte, $120, or five- and nine-course degustation menus, $150 and $190.

North and head chef, Monty Koludrovic, produce elegantly crafted modern French fare that celebrates the seasons. You can see the influence of North's mentor, the UK-based French chef Raymond Blanc is the exquisite winter still life, a picturesque dessert of "mushrooms" made from chestnut parfait and meringue, sprouting from an earth of crumbled chocolate and licorice cake with poached quince, confit chestnuts, crystallised fennel fronds and Armagnac sorbet.

Another influence, Pierre Gagnaire, appears in the juxtapositions and subversion of "forgotten" vegetables (swede, turnip, parsnip, kohlrabi, sweet potato, purple sapphire potato) with smoked pork jowl and yabbies. It arrives on one of several hand-made plates, with burning cedar wood scenting the air.

Winter is signalled again in the "bespoke" vegetable garden heritage veggies such as carrots and beetroot, turned or crisped, poking up from a bed of nut crumble with dried olive and goat's curd.

A main of "velvet" chicken (a reference to its texture) with spanner crab and sweet corn is just as pretty. This is food that looks too good to eat, in a meal that's orchestral in scope, swooping and soaring, one minute delicate, the next extravagantly rich. The only shortcoming, perhaps , is wines by the glass five whites and five reds on a list shared with Quarter 21, where the by-the-glass offerings differ. What's the point of fetching wines from next door for matches?

At Quarter 21, the pretension is stripped away. You get the feeling former Becasse head chef Michael Robinson is relishing more relaxed surrounds. It's still thoughtful, as an exquisite steak tartare, $12 for two, made from grass- and grain-fed beef, with quail's egg and onion ring, suggests. With entrees in the mid-$20s, it's not cheap, but a ballotine of rabbit with walnuts muscatels, $25, is as superb as the sauteed king prawns with crunchy strips of pig's ear and garlic custard on a smear of vivid green persillade puree, $26.

He delivers smartly presented fare bustling with flavour on an expansive, 30-dish menu. Pressed lamb belly and roast cutlet with Jerusalem artichoke and preserved lemon and anchovy jus, $38, is a cracker main. However I'll keep returning for the $6 mini margarita, a small dessert of tequila jelly with lime granita and pink salt.

Last week, Michel Roux, patron of the UK Michelin three-star The Waterside Inn, declared Europe's fine dining days over, killed off by bureaucracy and high costs. Only hotel restaurants will survive, he said. Australia has posh surrounds and food underpinned by hotels, casinos and now, shopping centres. Perhaps North's shift to Westfield marks the end of fine dining as we know it. Alternatively, this is a great new beginning.

HOW THEY RATED: Quarter 21 & Becasse (Level 5, Westfield Sydney, cnr Pitt St Mall and Market St, Sydney; ph 9283 3440)

QUARTER 21
Food: 15/20
Staff: 8/10
Drink: 4/5
X-factor: 4/5
Value: 9/10
THE SCORE OUT OF 50: 40

BECASSE
Food: 18/20
Staff: 9/10
Drink: 4/5
X-factor: 4/5
Value: 8/10
THE SCORE OUT OF 50: 43