LuMi - Letting the light of delight shine

 

Lumi - is, I'm assured, the Italian for Small Lights. It is these tiny dangling lights, visible behind Drew in this photo which gives the place its name.

It is owned and run by Chef Federico Zanellato, see below, who offers a fine dining experience which he describes as "serving modern Italian food with a Japanese twist". It seems he knows what he is doing having won the Best Italian Restaurant in the World by Gambero Rosso International and regularly appearing in the Australian top 100 restaurants.

The whole brigade are visible from the restaurant. Both the photos above and below were taken from our seats, which had excellent views.

Before going into the detail of the meal - first an excuse. Over the years we have been going out for, what Drew calls, Poncy Dinners, we have made sure we have separated them by a few days to allow recovery from the pleasure of one to the next one. This is what we did in 2021 in East Anglia, 2022 in Devon and 2023 in Europe, where we had less Poncy dinners. However, the pattern for this holiday didn't allow for that. The route we had taken and the eating scene in Australia meant that most of the posh dining would be in Perth and Sydney, though we could have found some places in Brisbane. With this in mind and due to the plethora of excellent eating places in Sydney and the fact that most are closed on a Sunday, meant that we have ended up eating in fine dining restaurants for three days in a row. Drew felt he was still stuffed from the preceding night in St. Peter's when we arrived at LuMi. I, who grew up to eat everything put before me, didn't see the challenge. This is our last Poncy dinner before Tokyo - honest! [Co-pilot's note: I believe, dear readers, that our valiant blogger and I might have a slightly different definition of Poncy dinner, I will leave you to judge in the forthcoming days.]

Our first challenge was to recognise what was before us - the lovely Florence brought us plates with some white tablets on them, pour a scented water over them and they grew like this.

But what are they, luckily Drew had heard her say they were hand towels, so we wiped our hands with them, not attempted to eat them 😁

We had opted for the Omakase menu which has nine courses, but includes a first course with seven small plates - which might make the counting 16! But what is a small number between friends!!

 

The first dish was a Cannolo it was made from Beetroot and shitake with a lemon balm, but actually had all the tastes of Christmas! It was really lovely.

Unusually for Sydney the restaurant didn't have a non-alcoholic drinks pairing menu, so we opted to have one cocktail each and then stay with our sparkling water.

I began with a drink called a Mia, it was a sweet, spiced and sour style drink with Cinnamon, Pineapple and Lime.

Drew tried the Seedlip Garden - Lime and ginger, Seedlip is a non-alcoholic spirit with the flavour of peaches and hay and it went down rather well.

Our second small plate was called Scarlet Prawns, it was a peanut tart with scarlet prawns, yuzu and fried carrot - a little taste of delight. The carrot grated on top gave it a lovely colour.

Next was Pie Tee, a oyster tart with herbs, topped by caviar - delicious and juicy.

The Japanese element of the restaurants style was clearly seen in the next item. Gunkan, an oval ball of sushi rice wrapped in a band of nori with sushi on top - light with a peppery aftertaste - I didn't catch the name of the fish, but I didn't car I was to busy enjoying the flavour.

This was followed by my favourite of these starter dishes, the Potato and Wagyu, this had a burnt kombu crisp (thankfully not a tuile as I'm challenged to spell that as some may have spotted in previous days!) on the top and a layer of potatoes at the base and luscious wagyu beef between them. Meaty, crisp and scrumptious, I'd have more of that if it was available.

Next came a Kombu Tart with crisp chicken skin, horseradish sauce and a variety of herbs and spices in a crisp delightful tart. This was so delicate, but so rich in flavour it is hard to describe the sensation on the palette. They are all flavours I have tried many times before, but combined in this way they became sensational.

Our, almost, final beginning was a Scampi Toast, prawn toast is world renowned as a simple dish - not here where it has a complete makeover with the shrimp on a crunchy sourdough with crisp shitake mushrooms and a tangy, sharp and peppery sauce - not as easy to eat as some of the smaller ones, but amazingly ambrosial. I could do that again, a few times!

Finally, for the little plates, came a dish simply called on the menu - Croissant. Yet it was a Savory Croissant with porcini butter - as crumbly as crunchy as the best Paris croissants, flakes were flying everywhere as we cut (Drew) or ripped (me) it open. It was a joy and delight which became even greater with the earthy addition of the porcini butter.

So on to the main part of the menu and we begin with Crudo, this Snapper sashimied and paired with mandarin, vinegar sharpness and delightful beansprouts was delicious. There were probably four other ingredients mentioned - but I only managed to remember the key ones - my mouth was tingling with the pleasure of eating this - such sharp, yet subtle flavours - a wonder and a delight.

Following the snapper was a Lobster Chawanmushi, now we have had chawanmushi in many restaurants over the years, but this one added a level of flavour to the savoury custard, that was unexpected. It included fish roe and Japanese herbs. Robust, rich and luscious it was a real treat.

For our next dish we had Toothfish. This locally caught toothfish was served with saffron sauce, confit potato, orange, persimmon and scallops. It was sweet and sour and so lovely I can't use enough words - if you are ever within a 100 miles of Sydney make the effort of coming here and eating this amazing, tasty, astoundingly well prepared food, with so much invention and creativity combining the best of at least two different cultures culinary scenes.

The meal continued with a more serious dish, the plate sizes are now starting to get larger and this Yabby well deserved the space. The South Australia yabby (a crayfish), garlic foam, sugar snaps and pea puree were cooked in clarified butter, giving a succulent and earthy flavour. The yabby was rich and full-bodied, the sugar snaps and puree make the dish taste like the first days of spring - which it is here! What a wonderful pleasure.

In keeping with its Italian heritage the next dish we had was Tagliolini Seafood Ragu. Drew wanted to get his ruler out to check that this was Tagliolini not either spaghetti or tagliatelle - but we believe the chef!! [Co-pilot's note: Do, dear readers, we hell!]

The pasta was served with a generous helping of cubed Sea Trout and a seafood ragu, with parsley and tomato and other treats to many to mention (or remember). If the next course hadn't arrived this would have been my champion of the day - the depths of flavour this chef can get into a dish are astounding.

The 'main' course was Quail, it was a Quail Wellington with a mandarin reduction and squash all served with a quail demi-glace jus. It was so good you get a photo from the side and the top to demonstrate how well it looks, well folks, it eats even better. Rich and delicious.

Our palette cleanser for the evening is a Blueberry and Rose sorbet with Chantilly cream and a blueberry reduction - such bitter flavours from the sorbet with the cream and reduction balancing them with some sweetness, but I preferred the bitter, as I always do.

This was followed by Coffee and ricotta ice cream with coffee sauce, cinnamon crumble and hazelnuts - the crunch made this exceptional - the flavours were great, but the crumble and the nuts made it an exceptional dish, not just a great one

Finally (making this 18 not 16 if you counted the plates) came the petite fours. With an Almond Frangipane which was very, very sweet, with a tang of orange and lemon. Drew managed both with delight glad that I had remembered I don't like sweet things.

The meal finished with salted chocolate and chocolate ganache on a chocolate biscuit base, with salt crystals on the top - who can complain - that's my kind of dessert, salty rather than sweet and a great conclusion to an amazing meal.

We have had some great food in Sydney, the posh, careful cooking of Quay, the clever quirkiness of St. Peter and now the combination of two unlikely bedfellows, Italian and Japanese cuisine. Each has been a treat and I'd find it hard to choose between them. But tonight's certainly wins the interesting and memorable category of any prizes I might give.

We caught the light railway and train back to Kings Cross and the hotel. We finally got to bed, tired but content at just after midnight.