Oborozuki is a French Japanese restaurant in Circular Quay. While it has been here since 2022 as a kaiseki restaurant, it has just changed to a 3 or 4 course menu under Head Chef Daeun Kang. Take a look at what the food is like and some of the unique experiences here at Oborozuki.
In late 2022 Oborozuki opened as a post lockdown luxury restaurant and bar with a kaiseki menu of $380 a head and a special dinner for $800 a head. Things have changed recently and as of this year the restaurant now offers a 3 or 4 course menu for $180 and $220 per person respectively. The restaurant also has a private dining room with a sunken table for 12 and three teppanyaki rooms with a different menu altogether.
Oborozuki is located on the Southern end of the East Circular Quay precinct in the Opera Residences building at Bennelong Point on Macquarie Street. Oborozuki means "hazy moon" in Japanese, a tribute to the view of Sydney Harbour outside. It is owned by the Tong Sheng Group who also operate Panda Yum Cha, YX Mini Hot Pot and Machi Machi.
The restaurant sits across two levels: the upper level which is where the greeter is as well as the bathrooms and teppanyaki rooms. The main restaurant is down the curved spiral staircase.
We are waiting upstairs for a bit wandering around until a few minutes later they came upstairs to show us to our table. Unfortunately all of the tables by the window view are taken ."These are booked months in advance," the woman tells us so we opt for a semi circular booth tucked away in the back. If I can't have a view I may as well be as comfortable as possible in a booth.
There is a 3 and 4 course menu with 3 snacks. Our waiter Simon is lovely and friendly explaining everything in detail even down to what an amuse bouche is.
First things first: you may see a Louis Vuitton trunk being wheeled around the restaurant. Sake sommelier Donggeon Kim brings the trunk around and opens it up to reveal a colourful array of sake glasses. He asks us to choose our favourite colour and I choose pink while Mr NQN chooses orange.
He takes out four glasses and asks me to pick my favourite pattern of the four. I choose the one that looks like it has a flame pattern on it. "That's the kitsune or fox. It brings fortune," he explains. All of the glasses are made using the Edo Kiriko glass blowing technique. Mr NQN chooses a flower glass which is traditionally a pattern used on government houses.
Then he shows us the sake chiller with big cubes of ice to keep the sake as chilled as possible. He presses down on the dispenser and the sake pours into a bowl and then it is served into the glasses.
The snacks arrive. The mussel cruller donut is a tiny swirl of savoury cruller donut underneath a plump black mussel blanketed with sudachi (citrus fruit) aioli, pickled cabbage and dill. They recommend starting with this one. It's nice but the cruller donut is a little dry.
Hosomaki is a small type of sushi with just one filling. This one is filled with takana (a mustard green, similar in taste to wasabi) topped with avocado and salt bush. This is a deliciously tasty mouthful with just the hint of the mustard green and a squiggle of avocado puree to soften it.
The favourite snack for both of us is the king fish tart with oysters and Granny Smith apple. I love the paper thin gyoza pastry tart shell with oyster emulsion, compressed Granny Smith apple and Sea Grapes (Umibudo) on top. It's a perfect mix of flavours and textures.
After the snacks are cleared they bring the sourdough slices with house made seaweed butter made with kombu and nori, a very umami and delicious butter.
It's now time for our first course. There are four selection for each course and the first one is vegetarian and we were curious to see what the vegetarian course was like. The tomato tarte tatin is paired with a chèvre sauce, cippolini onion pureem, umeshu caramel and lemon thyme. The tomato tarte tatin is more on the French side rather than the Japanese but has Japanese elements to it like the umeshu caramel.
We both loved the coral trout with its delicate sesame flavour. There are four slices of raw coral trout over a creamy wasabi mousse and on the other side is thinly sliced daikon and Kristal caviar. I like the light crunch of thinly sliced daikon and the soft coral trout with creamy wasabi that looks fiercer than it is.
We decide on another vegetarian course as I love vadouvan or curry. The soba noodles are thin and flat and topped with puffed rice, a quail's egg yolk, Andean potatoes and is finished at the table with Espelette pepper chilli oil. The idea is to mix it all up and eat it straight away so that the texture of the noodles is preserved. It's creamy and rich with light bites of crunch from the pufffed grain. While the vegetarian and French influenced courses are nice, the more Japanese style courses are really where the food shines.
Take the blue eyed cod roulade for example served with pickled cauliflower, ika yaki (grilled calamari), mozoku (Japanese brown algae) and sake lees. They fashion the fish into a sausage shape and then roll it up and steam it. This is served with a calamari consomme at the table. The texture of the fish although steamed is still beautifully luscious.
It comes time for our mains and one of the tables at the window is now free as it is around 9pm and the first seating has finished. We move to this table where they serve us the mains. Mr NQN has the toothfish with sake beurre blanc sauce, celeriac and fennel puree and a separate bowl of fennel and celeriac salad terrine to refresh the palate. I love this fish for its beautiful texture, luscious texture and large flakes.
But if you're looking for something divinely rich and indulgent, the A5 Miyazaki Wagyu Striploin is worth it if you're looking to drop an extra $100 for the supplement. This is one of the most beautifully marbled styles of beef and it's always a treat when you get to eat it. This is paired with a yellow squash barigoule, béarnaise sauce and wilted spigarello on top. There is also the option to get freshly shaved black winter truffles on top from Western Australia. If you're looking to impress and love highly marbled meat this is the course and the truffles add to the umami flavour of the beef.
For good measure we also order the roasted kipfler potatoes served sliced, crispy and golden with a dollop of Mentaiko crème fraiche and rosemary on top.
Before dessert proper comes out, there is a palate cleanser with a caramel striped sorbet and poached pineapple that prepares us for the desserts.
The sake baba sudachi is actually not what I expected as it is a version of the traditional rum baba. Here the cake is soaked in sake umeshu and then covered in a sudachi cream with freeze dried citrus, marigold and a sugar disc. This is their signature dessert and they add some pearls of sorbet chilled in dry ice at the table. Admittedly I'm not a huge rum baba person so this is more for Mr NQN who doesn't mind wet cakes.
The chestnut dessert has a coffee genoise sponge with squiggles of chestnut and mascarpone cream. To the side is a cacao nib infused ice cream and marron glace and nashi pear gel. This is the sweeter of the two desserts although it never really approaches too sweet in taste. I particularly enjoy the chestnut elements to this.
To digest, we have some Jayne the Queen tea, a version of Earl Grey tea with lavender notes which is perfect for after dinner. This comes with four petit fours: a yuzu filled dark chocolate, a tiny pistachio macaron and mandarin pate de fruits. There are also tiny slices of pink grapefruit on the plate to really refresh the palate, perfect after a rich, 4 course meal.
So tell me Dear Reader, would you go for 3 or 4 courses? Do you enjoy highly marbled meat?
NQN and Mr NQN dined as guests of Oborozuki but all opinions remain her own.
Oborozuki
Level 3, 5/71 Macquarie St, Sydney NSW 2000
+61 426 111 999
https://www.oborozuki.com.au/
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