Automata, Chippendale, review

Mechanical ornaments hang from the ceiling while the kitchen produces some of the best food in Australia.

Pistons, steel, aluminium, old aircraft engines suspended from the ceiling ... now that I have the ladies' attention, what about something for the lads?

Cool, creamy yoghurt sorbet with finger lime; slow-roasted quail with fermented pumpkin; raw scallop in a vegetal, earthy Jerusalem artichoke juice. There's something for everyone at Automata, built around the outstanding hard-man-with-asoftside mechanical/industrial designs of architect/custom-bike builder Matt Darwon (aka Matt Machine) ... it's another story.

Part of the Kensington Street redevelopment in inner-Sydney Chippendale, it's nine months in and this place has the poise of a veteran and some of the most utterly delicious new food Sydney — Australia, even — has seen.

It starts with a thoughtful beverage list at a small, plate-steel table set with Scandi-inspired blond timber chairs. Most diners are at a long, timber communal table that forms a spine on the ground floor and is replicated upstairs on a suspended "island". Clever.

If the look, with all those hard materials and Kraftwerk-like, identically shorn chefs is a bit tough, the floor staff are lambs. The menu is its own, vaguely Japanese, modern thing. Lots of fermented, umami-ish flavours expertly counterpointed with sweeter items.

And lots of uncooked things, too.

Like an appetiser of fresh enoki rolled in a slice of seasoned, grilled wagyu, or those sweet, raw scallop slices with salty diced roe, crunchy chopped pomegranate, Jerusalem artichoke juice and mint oil. Sublime.

Thick tablets of raw, firm kingfish, cured and doused in earthy seaweed oil, are served on a cloud of crème fraîche mixed with yuzukosho — a paste made from chilli, yuzu peel and salt; on top are subtly citric pellets of pomelo flesh and small cut-out discs of the herb shiso.

Steamed hapuku — again, sublime fish — comes on a taramalike paste of John Dory roe with a few bits of seaside succulent, seaweed powder, a napping of seaweed butter and a silken shawl of laver, the iodine-rich seaweed of Britain's west coast.

Again layering textures, a puree of miso pumpkin comes with very delicate, super-moist slow-cooked quail breast; add braised pumpkin seeds, crunchy ribbons of pumpkin and a scattering of freeze-dried mandarin. It's a bewitching mix of sweetness and savoury with clever textures. And it gets better.

A piece of firm, fleshy, coldsmoked lamb neck is charcoalgrilled to order and finished with a light, ever-so-slightly bitter sumacspiced lamb jus and a seasoning of fried capers; alongside you get a fruity piece of witlof steamed in fermented red cabbage juice, finished with a "salad" of baby capers and shallot dressed with mustard oil, preserved lemon and za'atar, on a mattress of eggplant puree. There's such harmony to it all. Such refreshing common sense.

And by-the-glass choices are good, if a little pricey.

So, after such a series of impressive, original dishes, it can only go to shit, right? Not so fast ... A layer of Italian meringue is finished with another of creamy, tart yoghurt sorbet (pictured), studded with discs of fresh persimmon crusted in sumac, "crisps" of zingy freeze-dried plum, and the citrus "caviar" of finger lime. It gets a little moat of rosemary oil, providing a nonconforming counterpoint that works. This dessert is so good, I ordered it again. It took far too long to get to Automata.

AT A GLANCE

ADDRESS:

5 Kensington Street, Chippendale, NSW

CONTACT:

[phone]

automata.com.au

HOURS:

Lunch Fri., Sat; dinner Tue-Sat

TYPICAL PRICES:

Set menu $88 plus drinks

SUMMARY:

Velvet fist in an iron glove

LIKE THIS? TRY ...

Wildflower, Perth; Paper Daisy, Cabarita

 * * * * 1/2