Melbourne’s Scott Pickett tipped to be opening fourth restaurant
Scott Pickett stakes a new Estelle, Sam Aisbett opens in Singapore, Paul Wilson goes to market, and other kitchen gossip.
It’s a long way from High Street, Northcote, to Domain Road, South Yarra. But we understand the journey to be well and truly on for ambitious Melbourne chef/restaurateur Scott Pickett, who is close to signing on a site near the Botanical Hotel for his next restaurant.
Pickett is a firm “no comment” but the next restaurant will probably be another Estelle Bistro. He surely didn’t put on a highly experienced operations manager recently (Anthony Musarra) simply to oversee three smallish restaurants (Estelle by Scott Pickett, Estelle Bistro and St Crispin)? Pickett is one of literally dozens of influential Australian chefs trained by Briton Phil Howard at The Square, in London — an enduring institution of excellence that has attained two Michelin stars for 19 consecutive years. Howard has had a profound influence on Australian restaurant culture over the restaurant’s 25 years. Last week came news that the chef and his business partner, Nigel Platts-Martin, has sold the business to Marlon Abela Restaurant Corporation.
SINGAPORE: Our expat of the week is former Quay head chef Sam Aisbett, who has finally opened his own place, in Singapore. “Whitegrass Restaurant has been open now for six weeks,” says Aisbett via courier pigeon. “Things are going well, people seem to be enjoying it. But it’s a monster — 70 seats.” There’s a Quay-like menu with Japanese accents (Aisbett trained at Tetsuya’s) heavily reliant on Australian ingredients including marron, mountain pepper, desert lime and Tasmanian beef. The local press has been kind. “Whitegrass isn’t just another pass from Down Under peddling roo burgers and fork-pressed avocado,” said Time Out. “The cooking is ambitious and the techniques bear the hallmarks of a pro.” Despite faint praise for desserts, Time Out’s Natasha Hong concluded: “This brand of ingredient-attuned cuisine, refracted through an Australian lens, is still nascent in Singapore — but this first ‘G’day mate’ is pretty damn impressive.”
MELBOURNE: Paul Wilson, chef and all-round food man known on both sides of the Murray, has christened his new baby a month before birth. Wilson & Merchant, at the Prahran Market, will have a bistro, produce store and wine bar, and is the big man’s first solo business venture. Wilson has put on chef Dave Marshall to head up the kitchen team, a former Wilson colleague at Melbourne Pub Group and The Botanical with La Tante Claire (London), Bistrode and The French Saloon on his CV. “Marshall is one of the most modest and hardest working, naturally talented cooks I’ve had the pleasure of working with,” says Wilson. “(He) will support our endeavours to hit the ground running with consistent and delicious seasonal food.” Here’s hoping.
MELBOURNE: Less comforting news for another Melbourne Pub Group alumnus, chef Stephen Burke, who left as executive chef in January to join another much bigger pub company, Sand Hill Road. Short season. “Unfortunately Stephen has since left the group,” said a Sand Hill spokesman last week, “with Stephen respectfully foreseeing a difference in desired direction for the food operations of the business.” Creative differences, as they say in rock ’n’ roll. SHR’s imminent major project is a four-storey pub on the former Rosati site, in Melbourne’s Flinders Lane.
ADELAIDE: One of this city’s more forward-thinking young food and wine entrepreneurs, Josh Baker, is about to open his next venture. Baker, best known for founding Coffee Branch and collaborating with partners at Clever Little Tailor and, more recently, Pink Moon Saloon, has teamed with chef Stuart Wesson for Whistle and Flute, in the suburb of Greenhill. Wesson was 2012 Electrolux Appetite for Excellence Young Chef of the Year. He says: “Food is a bit hard to pin down to one category. It’s really just food that I want to eat; generous serves, nice bright zingy flavours, lots of crunchy textures and layers of spice, heaps and heaps of fresh herbs and lettuces, dabbling with Thai and Chinese flavours, then some Middle Eastern as well.” They open on April 4.
lethleanj@theaustralian.com.au