Restaurant review: Clementine, Yass

This restaurant in a converted country house in NSW could teach some city joints a thing or two.

Familiar yet special: what a country town restaurant should be. Picture: Sean Davey

It’s Saturday night, small-town regional NSW. Broad streets, wide verandas, Victorian buildings untouched for years, shops shut for the weekend. There’s a Drysdale-esque Cricketers quality to the scene as a gentle euphoria descends on a hard-working community savouring brief respite from its workaday cares.

But there’s more to the pretty, historical town of Yass than time-honoured rituals. Clementine, a little restaurant in a renovated old home, seems to me a template for what a country town restaurant really should be. It’s smart, but not in a polarising manner: polished pine, bold hues for the walls, pretty cushions on the banquettes. You can overlook some of the rough edges of service; they come from a good place.

The food is locally sourced, well cooked, presented with flair but truly accessible. Real. You get the feeling chef/owner Adam Bantock doesn’t spend his time-off driving to Batemans Bay looking for coastal succulents. The wine list does its best to represent the region, with producers such as Bryan Martin’s Ravensworth at Murrumbateman. Both aspects of consumption at Clementine represent solid value for money; the feeling is that locals are being looked after.

Hence, this Saturday night is a joyous, broad church. Families with young kids, date nighters, empty nesters, a guy on the front veranda with wine and a laptop. And us.

Bantock’s menu is Med-inspired – familiar, harmonious flavours and ingredients – but very much his own thing rather than slavish reproduction of classics. The format is familiar to anyone who can still remember the ’70s: snacks, entrees, mains and desserts. Revolutionary.

Excellent sobrassada (fermented chilli pork paste) screams “sherry” and “Spain”: a generous dollop of the red sausage with pickled shallot and fresh fennel, pickled anchovy, fresh herbs and crispbread wafers (they make their own bread). That’s a $9 snack and, for most, a perfectly adequate starter. An entree tomato salad (pictured) is delicious, with a jumble of heirloom tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, roasted capsicum, black olives, dill, baby rocket, capers, lemon verbena and thyme all bursting with summer promise, generosity and the antithesis of Tortured Tweezer Syndrome. Another cold salad combines strips of cuttlefish and spanner crab meat with fresh fennel, red grapefruit and smoked paprika. It’s under-seasoned but easily fixed; fresh, clean, typically generous.

Bigger, more robust, but no less considered is local free range pork saltimbocca – firm pieces of meat but full of flavour with their salty prosciutto crust on a saffron risotto with a moat of tomato “jus”. And house-made cavatelli pasta gets the aquatic version of prosciutto – mojama – along with tuna, prawns, cherry tomatoes, parsley and chilli in a clean, balanced and very enjoyable broth. It’s familiar, yet special – Clementine’s leitmotif.

The kid waiting tables who says “here you go” when he delivers a plate? I’ll take that over supercilious any time. And there are plenty of waiters keeping the tempo right.

Desserts are probably a lesser attraction: mascarpone mousse with an amaretto biscuit, caramel and warm choc sponge is a bit too cakey. Far preferable is a rhubarb parfait served with roasted rhubarb, sprinkled honeycomb and warm gingerbread. The latter rounds out a solid package, astutely targeting its audience with food that overdelivers because it doesn’t overreach. In other words, a great Saturday night out in Yass. With a lesson that could be taught far and wide.

Clementine’s entree tomato salad. Picture: Sean Davey

AT A GLANCE

Address: 104 Meehan St, Yass

Contact: 02 6226 345; clementinerestaurant.com.au

Hours: Lunch Fri-Sun; dinner Thu-Sat

Typical prices: Starters $20; mains $31; dessert $14

Like this? try... Templo, Hobart; No. 1 Bent Street, Sydney

Summary: Country comfort

Rating: 3 1/2 Stars