The degustation is now a staple of modern dining culture, with chefs from around the world keen to show off their signature dishes – as well as road test a few new ideas – to their customers, through a night of multiple courses, matching wines and, as is all the rage, a theme to go along with it. Bishop Sessa in Surry Hills is just one local restaurant to embrace the concept, with acclaimed chef Paul Cooper serving up a regular degustation experience meant to push the boundaries of modern cuisine.
On the 18th of April 2013, restraurant owner Erez Gordon, alongside chef Paul Cooper, winemaker Alex Retief and Matt Simons of Melanda Park Free Range Pork kindly invited us to come along for their monthly feast, which in this instance was celebrating the pig, in a toe to tail degustation accompanied by a selection of wines from local producers A. Retief, who grow all their wine in NSW. Yes, vegetarians and lovers of pigs (while living) should probably not read ahead, as we ate just about every part of the animal you can think of. For the rest, please read on…
The first course was a pine geranium smoked pork leg, which was essentially a take on the common form of sliced ham you’d get at any butcher. But here, the unique texture of the leg gave it the sort of quality that made it melt in your mouth, while the smokey tones around its edges rounded out its flavour nicely. The meat was accompanied healthily by radishes, carrots, peas and mustard which, when combined all together (as I tend to like to do), was a sound starter for the more adventurous options to come.
The course was accompanied by a 2011 Sauvignon Blanc/Semillon which was a smooth drop; an easy start to the evening. Our second course, which was the “Surf and Turf” equivalent of this degustation, was appropriately accompanied by a 2011 Chardonnay, which was a stronger white compared to the Sav, but without the normal level of sweetness one would attribute to the grape. Delicious and smooth; what more could you want?
The course featured a thick, juicy, perfectly cooked scallop to act as our “surf”, and a stuffed pig trotter (yes, you read that right) was the “turf”. The stuffing was black pudding, which naturally had the texture of ground oats. Even with the added intensity of the crackling sprinkled over the dish, the balance between meats worked surprisingly well, though the picked plums and onions gave the dish some much needed sweetness, and the “rooftop garden herbs” helped balance out the strong flavours found elsewhere nicely. It was arguably the most daring of the dishes, but was a resounding success.
A 2012 Cabernet Rose helped cleanse our palates as we moved from the whites to the reds, and went down as easily as water; nothing much to talk about here, but it’s a safe rose without a doubt. The 2010 Mataro – a grape which has made a resurgence in recent years – would come with the next course, and though a strong, dark red, it found itself hard to compete with the red that would follow. But more on that later.
The next dish was a combination of the expected and unexpected. A perfectly cooked pork belly, with celeriac and the magic ingredient: apple! It was as perfect a piece of pork belly as you’d ever had. The piece was accompanied by a slice of pork loin, something you wouldn’t normally find in such a dish, and was a beautifully moist and appetising part of the animal, though not as flavourful as the belly beside it. The heirloom beets and wild mushrooms were particularly necessary here as a result, and a sound choice to round off the disfh
The Piggy “Pot Au Feu” was the dish we were all most excited about experiencing, with three parts of the animal on display. First, there was the slow cooked pork scotch, then the pig head cotechino – which for those unfamiliar is a type of sausage similar to salami in texture – and finally a rolled pig tail, which was stuffed with an almost cream cheese like filling. I guess the best way to describe what the pigs tail was like would be to compare it to the texture of prosciutto. It seemed to have been prepared similarly. This part of the dish was the its most divisive inclusion, and was best when eaten along with either the scotch or the cotechino – both of which were delicious, and represented the diversity of the animal brilliantly, with the taste and texture of both far removed than the belly and loin that preceded it.
The Pot Au Feu was accompanied by the highlight of the evening, an extraordinary Cabernet blend from the Canberra Hilltops, which the maker called a “rolling boulder of flavour” and he wasn’t too far off point. I don’t think I can top such a description. The desert wine was next, a seemingly surprising choice with a 2010 Botrytis Grenache. It’s sweet, but not too thick – light enough to stomach after a huge meal, but sweet enough to sit alongside similar dessert wines, and in that it was a perfect way to bring the meal to an end.
As for the dessert itself, it was given the appropriate title “Bacon, Bacon, Bacon” and moved away from the common choice of bacon and chocolate, and instead went for a perfect lemon verbena parfait. The parfait was covered with salted caramel bacon, bacon praline and crispy pig skin, which tasted a little bit like popcorn, as a few of us observed. Amazingly it worked, though I think by this point we were pretty pleased that this would be the end of our degustation. That’s a lot of pork…
All in all, like most degustations this was an experience as much as it was a feast. We were given a taste of what may be one off dishes; an opportunity to see chef Paul Cooper at his most inventive. It was also a treat to have the winemaker and the pig farmers in the room to discuss their contributions to the meal.
With Bishop Sessa holding degustation every six weeks or so, what will make up the next degustation will be anyone’s guess, but if chef Paul Cooper can provide this much variety with the pig, we can only imagine which he has up his sleeve for the next event. We highly recommend making it out to it to experience it all for yourself.
DETAILS:
The degustation cost $115 for all five courses and six wines. The restaurant is located at 527 Crown Street, Surry Hills. For more details visit: http://www.bishopsessa.com.au/.
