Boffins, Canberra review: medium bang theory

Canberra’s Boffins has been in business since 1973 and has had a sexy rejig. Long may it last.

Boffins restaurant. Picture: Tess Godwin

“Boffins?” mutters my contact as I cast a net across Canberra’s food intel pond, hoping for a catch. “Haven’t been since 1997.” No help.

Yet Boffins may well be worth closer inspection: new look, new chef, new menu, same old University House (ANU) bones. It has the whiff of promise. Indeed, Boffins has been in business since 1973.

And so we cross the threshold at Uni House, “a boutique hotel, contemporary functions [venue], and the ceremonial heart of the ANU”. It is also the university’s oldest residential college, opened in 1954. Through a foyer, past a library, along a lengthy internal veranda, past functions and meetings in progress and, finally, to the restaurant.

Despite a sexy rejig, it’s difficult to get around Boffins’ institutional roots. The original parquet flooring has been polished to a sheen; new paint, accessories and light fittings say “now”, yet those aforementioned “bones” – the building’s scale and materials, little things like acid-etched glass and brass plaques for the artworks – suggest Menzies-era design, solid and modest.

It may just be the only restaurant in Australia with pure cotton tablecloths serving a Negroni made with smoked gin. On the table is a document that talks the usual local/seasonal talk, support for small farmers, flexible menus and waste minimisation. Yet what sets Boffins apart is staff who glisten with pride in the enterprise and whose desire to please leaves by far the greater impression over the odd glitch, such as a Coravin wine dispenser that showers the table in wine (he warned there’d be “a bit of theatre”).

It contributes to a dining experience imbued with manners, humility, and eagerness to please; there’s a sense of distance, and a gentle ambience in which visiting academics can be welcomed by local profs in lanyards.

They bake their own sourdough; it comes with fancy-pants butter. The wine list has local gems, but alas, no undervalued old cellar classics. Still, the food is reasonably priced.

A starter called sashimi arrives promptly: six tablets of farmed kingfish scattered enthusiastically with white sesame, garlic chips, shiso leaves and hot green chilli, Nobu-style, sliced a bit thickly and too hot. There’s a ponzu dipping sauce. The heat is back, and more appropriately, for a tom yum-ish udon noodle coconut bisque, heavily flavoured with ginger, lemongrass and Thai basil. The protein is subtle: small prawns and crab meat. It’s an intense, viscous and likeable soup.

Boffins restaurant. Picture: Tess Godwin

And then, a salad of buffalo mozzarella (weirdly described as “cows curd cheese”) with malty/sweet pickled fennel, roasted pistachios, fennel oil and fronds.

From this small sample you see a fairly catholic approach to food. The theme persists with “substantial plates”: a vegetable curry, duck with radicchio, an “ever evolving fish”. Great Southern Pinnacle-brand “iron steak” (oyster blade; pictured) is sold by its distributor as “southern NSW” but the same website states it is sourced from areas far and wide.

Possibly local, possibly not, our beef is properly grilled and very tasty, served with dashi-poached whole baby pine mushrooms, charred baby red onions, a reduced dashi sauce and fresh horseradish. An excellent dish. Add smoked potato mash with celery gravy and skin crackling, and a (fine) leaf salad with kimchi dressing, and you’ve got a meal for two. You’ve also got an alternative to those noisy, all-about-us restaurants that are hard to avoid these days. Long may it last.

Boffins at a glane

Address: 1 Balmain Cres, Acton, Canberra

Contact: [phone]; unihouse.anu.edu.au

Hours: Lunch Tue-Fri, dinner Tue-Sat

Typical prices: Small $21, substantial $35, sides $9, dessert $17

Like this? Try... RACV Club, Melbourne

Summary: Medium bang theory

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars