Imagine biting into a beautifully executed sweet French pastry, a canelé, its crisp, chewy crust contrasting with a yielding inside, and experiencing the mouth-popping salt of caviar at the finish. This dessert best encapsulates the menu direction at Fysh, in Singapore’s Edition hotel, the latest project from acclaimed Sydney chef Josh Niland.

For the 102-seat Fysh is not like the chef’s Paddington flagship Saint Peter, nor any other iteration of his Sydney empire. This “seafood steakhouse” needs to be understood in the context of Singapore, an island city-state renowned for its high-end restaurants, with prices to match. Singaporean diners revere seafood, most of which is imported from around the world, and have different cultural and service expectations but love something edgy.

Don’t expect the intimacy of Saint Peter nor the buzz of his St Leonards bistro Petermen at Fysh. Singapore demands glamour, and the elegant, high-ceilinged room delivers, with marble tables, green velvet banquettes, lush plantings, and an imposing green marble bar. At intervals, 400g dry-aged Mooloolaba yellowfin tuna rib-eye and condiments are wheeled out theatrically for selection.

Fysh showcases Niland’s sustainable scale-to-tail philosophy – something new for Singapore – but its hotel location necessitates the menu’s inclusion of a couple of vegetarian dishes, along with a popular quail entrée, and chicken and sirloin main courses.

Niland, who won The Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide’s Chef of the Year award and was last week recognised in the long-list of The World’s 50 Best Restaurants (Saint Peter came in at number 98), is determined to create desirability around all parts of fish.

Former Saint Peter and Fish Butchery chef Luke Cawsey heads up the kitchen at Fysh, which is open daily for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

The food delivers on Niland’s trademark fishy sleight-of-hand. Why use beef to make cheeseburgers when you can season off-cuts of yellowfin tuna to make patties, then slide them into a sesame seed bun with mustard, chopped pickles and cheese?

Many of the dishes will be familiar to visiting Aussies and indeed, Niland is using many of his trusted Australian suppliers, alongside the occasional product sourced from ethical suppliers further afield, such as a Demarne turbot chop, farmed in France, served with seaweed tapenade.

Aquna Murray cod is all crisp skin and luscious flesh. Flaking easily, it finishes cooking as the warm plate lands on the table, complemented by smoked eel gremolata, herb salad and a lemony aioli. Mooloolaba yellowfin tuna steak tartare, eaten in crisp leaves of witlof, comes with all the traditional accompaniments, yet the tuna shines through.

After an impressive start, Fysh looks set to show Singaporeans there is far more to fish than two fillets, and more to Australian food than meat pies, macadamia nuts and pavlova.

Open breakfast daily 6.30am-10.30am; lunch daily noon-2.30pm; dinner Mon-Thu 6pm-10pm, Fri-Sun 6pm-10.30pm.

Edition Hotel, 38 Cuscaden Road, Singapore, editionhotels.com/singapore/restaurants-and-bars/fysh