Are there any Michelin rated restaurants in Australia?

[pilotgirl]

I've looked and looked but can't seem to find any.

[irisav]

No there aren't any Michelin rated restaurants - although I think it is because Australia has yet to be included as a 'contestant' so to speak, rather than it indicating a scarcity of worthy restaurants. There are other international guides and lists that do include some australian restaurants amongst their ranks.

[PhilD]

Michelin does not release a guide for Australia, which is a shame because I think a lot of Australian restaurants would do well, and from my recent experience I think Australia could get more stars in total than the UK....!

In the absence of Michelin probably the best national guide is found in Gourmet Travellers Top 10 for each city (http://gourmettraveller.com.au/top_10... and the associated 2009 award pages.

Both Sydney and Melbourne have good guides published by the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. They are critical guides (rather than advertorial) and score the restaurants out of 20, I think you need 12 to make it into the guide. They are not perfect but I find them reliable most of the time. Perth, Adelaide etc don't really have strong local guides and what they do have tends not to be that critical or objective

[mr_gimlet]

Phil, where do you think that Australia's top restaurants sit on the Michelin scale? The only (informed) opinion I've read was that one of the Hermanos thought Vue de Monde was 1-2*

[PhilD]

I don't see any 3 stars, probably because the style of restaurant is against it. My last meal at Becasse was a pretty good 2 star. On my last trip Universal may be a 1 star, but we spent most of the time in Margaret River and whilst we had good food most wouldn't make it as the food is a bit too simple. The exception may be "Knee Deep Winery", all the dishes there were better than many 1 stars have eaten in Europe, in-fact the vegetables were Passard standard...!.

I ate at Vue Du Monde about two years ago and was underwelmed. We had just moved from a 2 year stay in Paris and so the French cooking needed to be good to pass muster. I thought it gimmicky using average French sourced ingredients instead of better local Australian produce.

I thought Simon's (Dos Hemanos) visit to Australia was seriously flawed, my guess is that his guide/friends who helped him plan his eating let him down big time and he really missed out on the essence of modern Australian food.

A lot has changed since we last lived in Aus (4 years ago) so it is tricky to be definitive based on a few trips home. It is going to be interesting to revisit lots of restaurants and benchmark them against European/Michelin standards. On the evidence of the narrow sample we have tried recently there is some seriously great talent, cooking some great food. It is probably no coincidence that two top spots, The Ledbury and The Harwood Arms in London are both cheffed by Aussies (Brett was a Josephine Pignolet winner).

[PhilD]

I should add that Michelin only publishes guides for:

France, Spain (+Portugal), Italy, Germany, UK (+Ireland) Benelux, USA, Hong Kong (+Macau), and Japan.

Michelin are quite slow to go global, the Hong Kong and Japan books are recent (first and second editions respectively) and I believe they have only just released ratings for the US west cost in 2007

[ecumer]

I did some pondering on this topic a while ago, in the context of starred restaurants in San Francisco I've visited,

http://ongoldenfond.blogspot.com/2011...

I think there are, but my feeling is that they are at the 1-2 star level at most because there are aspects of format, presentation and such that are more important to the Michelin folks than to the Australian restaurant reviewers.

Jaques Reymond, Cutler * Co, Ezard, Attica, The Point, Movida (maybe) ... all these are as good as 1 * Michelin places I've been in SF (Masa's, Ame, Alexanders). Vue du Monde is pobably up there but I haven't dined there, just cocktails.

Cheers,

Ecumer

[kersizm]

I just came back from Japan and ate at the non-rated Michelin rated but very well regarded Aronia de Takazawa. Vue just isn't in the same league and is more expensive!

[mr_gimlet]

That's a bit of an indictment on Australian prices these days! I enjoyed Tokyo but I found the language barrier hard to overcome without help.

@ecumer, I'd agree with most of your list but not The Point. If The Point can get in then pretty much any restaurant in Melbourne can.

[ecumer]

Yeah, I might have been generous about The Point. I was trying to think of a steakhouse as good as Alexander's in SF, but there's a lot of technique and complexity going on there that The Point just doesn't bother with.

[PhilD]

An update - from recent meals - I put Attica at two stars and Movida as a solid one. i also thought Sepia in Sydney would get two and many one especially places like Sean's. And the Royal Mail is a good two with Provenance a good one my one. My visit to Vue du Monde a few yers back would have them as a one maybe but even then it would be reluctant.

[mr_gimlet]

I'd agree with those ratings. VdM has matured a lot and it is in the 2* class in their new home.