Cutler & Co

Cutler & Co That was the worst Andrew McConnell dining experience I’ve had.  Now, don’t get me wrong - that still puts this head and shoulders above the huge majority of Melbourne dining experiences (including a place that rhymes with poo duh wand).

But Andrew, I’m still disappointed in you. Three reasons:  First: I’ve had his food at Circa, Three One Two and Cumulus. There’s a pattern: amazing entrée, okay main, and excellent desserts. Time and time again. It’s as if he thinks a main should be big, heavy and gluggy. While still good, sometimes even great, they never are able to reach the heights of brilliance that the opening course sets out for them. McConnell doesn’t seem to be growing as a chef. This is largely the same food I would have had five years ago at Circa. This isn’t really a complaint, as it’s really stunningly good food - but having had this five years ago, I expect more now. I saw something special then, and want to see how it plays out.

Second: Much has been said about the room, how it’s architecturally designed and lovely to look at and gosh darn it look at all that money. I don’t care. It was LOUD. Uncomfortably so. Circa was subdued - tables far apart, lots of sound-absorbing stuff on the walls. Three One Two, due to its size and the fact it was shoehorned into a house, was also very quiet. Even Cumulus, with its huge open-plan setting, somehow manages to be fairly quiet. Not so at Cutler. We had to either lean in close or yell to communicate across our table of four.  I find myself comparing this room, which everyone is talking about, to the room at Attica, which everyone is also talking about, but for different reasons. The primary difference is that I can’t remember the room at Attica. I think it was beige and brown, but I can’t say for sure. I don’t care though, because I wasn’t there to eat the room. The point is that the room disappeared, and all I remember from that night was the food. I know, six months from now, I’ll still remember the room at Cutler & Co. I don’t think that’s a good thing. Cutler tries too hard, I think, to be a total experience, with as much thought put into the environment as the food itself. The problem is, it ends up being too overbearing (rather like the mains) - instead of allowing the food to stand on its own, as representative of the dining experience, it wants to dress it up with all kinds of extra stuff that just isn’t needed.

I’m reminded of an important lesson I learnt in art school. I’d found this lovely box thing with massive corrugated shock-absorbant sides to it (I think it had arrived with some kind of computer part in it), and I thought it was a great little object, and I could hand it in for sculpture class as “found art”. I was very much into Dada at the time. Anyway, after looking at it for a while, I decided that it was much too plain, and the fact that I hadn’t *done* anything to it would count against me in evaluating it for my grade in the class (and, by extension, my value as an artist, which was important to me at the time). So I got some paints and things and decorated the cardboard box. When I handed it in, the teacher was disappointed in me: “Why did you draw all over it?” he asked. “It would have been perfect just as it was”. Same thing with the food and the room. It would have been perfect as it was. It doesn’t need additional adornments.  Third: The service. I’m comparing to Mirca at Tolarno, and even the Carlisle Wine Bar, a vastly underrated local restaurant. In both of those places, magic pixies filled my water glass, and no matter how much wine I consumed, the glass would remain full. I didn’t notice the service at all. At Cutler & Co, they’re everywhere. The tables are closely spaced together, so bumping and jostling has to happen. The server we had was unfortunately very hard to hear (see point #2, above), and ended up bringing us the wrong digestiv after dinner. The service was highly visible, and not terribly responsive.

Okay, so I’m being very negative so far, and I realise that. But I’m trying to make the point that after having a string of really incredible meals at the hands of Andrew McConnell, I really expect something transcendent when eating at his flagship restaurant. Cumulus Inc shouldn’t be better, but it is. I think it comes down to something I touched on in the second point, above, and that is that Andrew still hasn’t figured out the main course. There’s something about that section of the menu that makes him just lose control and screw it up. This is why Cumulus is so good: there aren’t really any mains. Andrew seems to be all about “Small plates good, big plates average”.  So, Jurgen, what did you eat? Good question.

I started with what is now my official second favourite dish ever (displacing a smoked eel carpaccio from Circa - also a McConnell creation). It was a salad Lyonnaise. Wagyu beef tongue carpaccio as a base, some garlicy sausage stuff, a bit of baconish pig’s ear, gizzards and assorted other bits of thing. There was a tangy sauce too, and tiny cubes of happy crunchy stuff. Probably apple, maybe pear, but at that point my taste buds hit overload. I didn’t want to swallow the food, it was that good. I would have (and should have) happily eaten three plates of that. Brilliant stuff. I also got to sample some tuna sashimi, with horseradish sauce. Yum. So good it made a grumpy teenager smile (and that’s saying a lot). Also a bit of ocean trout, which was also very nice. Everyone was jealous of mine though. Ha-HA!  Next up was some veal. Well. I love veal. So does my cat. It was really nice veal, and there was a terrine-ish, sausage-ish kind of thing on a bed of greens. Some sauce too, and a smear of mash. And, well, yeah. Tasty and good, just good. Only good. Mains just aren’t measuring up. I tried a bit of fatayar pastry (very heavy) and the ever-present pork, and they were okay too, I guess. Sigh. Zzzz…

Dessert was amazing. I had a violet ice cream explosion with weird-ass rubbery bread-like stuff, sour cherries and chunks of sugar that tasted like chai. Bloody amazing. Fun and interesting (like the entrées), colourful and surprising. Really excellent.  HOWEVER: Mica’s dessert was the best dessert ever. Apologies to other pastry chefs who might be reading this, but holy crap. Wow.

It was beetroot ice cream.  Think about that. You’ll get a taste in your mind which is probably very accurate. That’s fine. There were other things on the plate - creamy things, citrussey things, spicy things, that just made the whole dish sing. I wasn’t allowed to eat any more than about two spoon-tips, but it was a work of brilliance.

So that was it. Cutler & Co. Will I be back? Probably, but I won’t be in a big hurry. Reckon we’ll be back at Attica before Cutler again. I suppose I’m damning with faint praise, but I think it’s deserved. Entrées and desserts are so good, it’s heartbreaking that the mains just don’t cut it. Andrew McConnell is (apparently) a lovely guy, and capable of so much more than this. I expect perfection, and he’s only giving me excellence. Horrible, isn’t it?  So go to Cutler & Co. Please go, it’s a wonderful restaurant with really lovely, surprising and tasty food. Bring earplugs, and don’t order a main. You might just have a perfect evening.