Attica

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Editorial Reviews

• Attica

  Dani Valent, Reviewer

  Tuesday, May 08, 2007

  You get the complexity and nimbleness of Thai cooking, but you're as likely to be eating cheese, black pudding or tomato as tofu or lychees.

  Chefs are always banging on about their suppliers. Their lettuces are massaged at sunset, the eels listen to Mozart, the salt is harvested by nymphs. Attica's Ben Shewry is different. This exciting young chef talks of the wild oregano he plucks from an unkempt yard near his home and the purslane (a succulent weed) he forages locally from cobbled laneways. Of course, most of Shewry's ingredients arrive via conventional routes, but the hunter-gatherer stuff points to a geeky inventiveness that results in some of the most interesting and fine-tasting modern food you'll find in Melbourne. When Shewry began here 21 months ago, the menu was dominated by his Thai dishes, which were authentically fragrant and punchy thanks, in part, to a stint with Aussie-Thai food guru David Thompson. There's still the odd curry, but the menu is less of a jaunt through south-east Asia and more about the evolution of Ben Shewry. The flavour-balancing ideas of Thai food - the juggle of hot, sour, salty, s...

  Source: The Age

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  Full review on The Age

• Attica

  John Lethlean, Reviewer

  Wednesday, July 04, 2007

  Bipolar fish, consomme in a test tube and power drills in the kitchen - something is cooking in Ripponlea.

  Dehydrators are the new ovens; a thing called the Thermomix the new bain marie and blender combined; and the Pacojet is the new ice-cream churn. But the cordless drill? It's the new, er, cordless drill. On any given morning, if you popped into Ben Shewry's small but endlessly inventive Ripponlea kitchen, you might find the young New Zealander slicing spiced brioche into rectangular blocks and drilling holes in each with his power drill. Then he pours a puree of dark quince into the void and uses crumbs and egg to block it up again. He soaks the whole thing in sugar syrup so that when it's baked, it gets a crisp, almost toffeed/toasted shell to it, revealing that burgundy-coloured molten fruit within when it's cut. And most chefs would be happy to serve this rather splendid creation with something vanilla, charge 15 bucks, and satisfy a lot of customers. Attica's Shewry, however, is a chef who ignores the path of least resistance. If there is a more interesting - but m...

  Source: The Age

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  Full review on The Age

• Attica

  Ultimate Melbourne

  Sunday, August 02, 2009

  An internal courtyard bathed in sunlight is the spot to sample great young chef Ben Shewry’s cooking. Be sure to try the smoked trout broth, crackling and basil seeds with fresh smoke.

  
  

• Attica

  The Age Good Food Guide 2009

  Thursday, September 11, 2008

  This is refined, lovely, surprisingly accessible food that sparkles with creativity and finesse.

  Sometimes, the trouble with great food is all the baggage that goes with it: you're made to feel like you should be kissing the chef's napkin ring while sitting in some temple to gastronomy. Not at Attica, an unassuming suburban restaurant with a comfortably stylish modern dining room, warm and well-mannered service and ? oh yes ? brilliant, original food. Young chef Ben Shewry knows the power of understatement; his fast-growing fan club know they can trust him, whether it's with seemingly random combinations like cauliflower cheese with blood plum and clove oil; a brave, confident dish of poached pork ? slow-cooked just to pink ? with confit turnips, nibs of black pudding and apple; or something playful like 'a selection of childhood memories', a sweet fantasia of fairy floss, sherbets and jubes complete with accessories. And while an entree of 'sea tastes' ? prawns, clams, sea flora, sea urchin, a crest of foam ? doesn't pack quite the dramatic ocean punch promised by the waite...

  Source: The Age

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  Full review on The Age

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