Dinner at Lucia
A suburban supergroup makes its play for the city crowd. Does it succeed?
One of the key challenges that budding restauranteurs in Melbourne face is convincing customers to trust them with their money. Without the credibility and reputation of a big name operator, a Grossi, a McConnell, a Lucas, it falls on venues to pitch themselves as something innovative or fresh. Today’s review is looking at a venue that takes a more circuitous route into the pantheon of Melbourne’s high end restaurants. South Melbourne’s Lucia appears to arrive fully formed as a modern lux venue, but is in fact the product of a budding restaurant empire in Melbourne’s suburbs. Encompassing Malvern East’s Riserva, Sandringham’s Baia di Vino, and Scoresby’s San Lorenzo, this group parlays the financial heft of those venues into a seat at the table in Melbourne’s tenuous dining landscape.
As anyone who hasn’t been submerged in carbonite for the last few years knows, it’s a particularly fraught time in hospitality. Our newsfeeds feel like a near daily deluge of restaurant closures, whether they be iconic long time operators like Tetsuya Wakuda and Kylie Kwong, or venues that just barely seemed to get going. Recently upon a recommendation from a friend, I was researching Bar Savarin in Cheltenham as a potential review subject. Unbeknownst to me, Bar Savarin had come and gone already. Given the air of dread around the industry, I approach any new venue bold and assured enough to open something with a degree of respect and enthusiasm; just by virtue of existing, it is a sign of an operator fighting against the rising tide.
And despite what seems like endless closures, some of us (certainly not me) still have money, and are dining out regularly. It’s still hard to get a booking at Gimlet. Suits still line the promenade window at Rockpool on a weekday lunch. Melbourne will never lose its inherent desire for good food and revelry, so ironically, the space is rife for disruption; there’s certainly enough vacancies in the CBD.
Designed by architectural firm Rothelowman and branding agency Blurr Bureau, Lucia occupies the bottom level of South Melbourne’s Eleven Eastern commercial precinct. This area of Melbourne is a tough sell; closed off by the prohibitive deadlock of Kings Way, the exterior of the venue gives little away as to what sort of restaurant lies inside. Indeed, Lucia is easy to miss, and on the night I visited the front entrance was not operational. Haphazardly printed A4 paper signs pointed to the side entrance, but it was a constant issue with guests attempting to enter through the closed off front all evening.
In terms of ambience, Lucia has what I would describe as, in the best way possible, a hotel or casino restaurant aesthetic. Soft, inviting, conducive to conversations either illicit or financial, with plush banquettes and a long, curved marble bar. This is what high end dining in 2024 looks like, an amalgam of Americanised steakhouse utility and lux Lake Como hotel glamour. A fresh iced seafood display adorns the bar, and an impressive open wine cellar on the far wall flexes some of the list’s 400-bottle strong muscle.
Lucia has cleverly negated any concerns about not having a celebrity operator attached by building from the Front Of House down. Regular diners at Entrecote and France Soir will recognise the charismatic Christian Janko, who leads the floor team with charm and flair. I recognised several other floor staff as tenured pros from France Soir and venues like Navi as well; it’s a mature, career floor pro frontline charm offensive, and service is very sharp as a result. In the kitchen Jordan Clavaron now serves as the group’s executive chef, and the produce-driven with a lux finish cuisine he honed at Cutler & Co and Society is right at home at Lucia. Society is a not inappropriate parable for Lucia, in that it is high-end by design, but perhaps a little confused about the ethos underlining it. On to the food.
I commenced my meal, as is customary, with a negroni. Lucia offers a house riff on the classic which claims to contain shiitake mushroom, but no trace of fungi flavour is detected. It is merely a more expensive basic negroni, though nicely mixed down and served neatly and elegantly in a well chilled, heavy cut glass tumbler.
In somewhat of a celebratory mood, my dining partner and I partake in Lucia’s caviar service. The airy, vaguely cheesy “donuts” that accompany the caviar are recognisable from Clavaron’s time at Cutler & Co, and are a fun way to transport the caviar from tin to mouth. Caviar service is fine but feels less ceremonial than the price would demand. A plain ceramic bowl is not befitting of the grandeur and old world charm a luxury like this should muster, and genre leaders like Gimlet and Reine dial up their presentation to 11. Room for aesthetic refinement in an otherwise successful dish.
A yellowfin tuna dish with acidic tomato concasse is attractive and skillfully dressed tableside. Already sitting on a romesco sauce, acidity overpowers the dish, the intensely vinegary tomato dressing curing the fish and leaving a beige strip of tuna along the bottom of the plate. This feels like a dish that’s taken a wrong turn and is being overthought. Rather unpleasant, I’d scrap it entirely and start again.
Our next dish, a petite individual beetroot “ravioli”, feels like a relic of yesteryear. Essentially a fat squadge of thick goats cheese between two raw tasting slices of beetroot, the dish is too large to be a canape, but too small to be a starter. The beetroot is sliced too thinly and tastes of almost nothing, and the dish is drowned out in a sea of brown butter. It’s a noble attempt at a bit of old school kitsch, and while appropriately priced at $9, is ultimately one-note and unsuccessful.
A generous plate of culatello (premium prosciutto made from a small, prized cut of pork) is stunning, of the highest quality and freshly sliced. A wobbly hay bale of house made buffalo ricotta is delicious, and verdant, peppery olive oil garnishes elegantly. This is closer to the mark of the direction I think Lucia should be heading towards; less interventionist, showcasing premium produce simpy, and allowing the charms of the staff and venue to do the rest.
My dining partner’s beef tenderloin arrived artfully arranged, displaying the sort of care and affection for seasonality that has been lacking on menus. A madeira jus is glossy and well made, and variations on seasonal ingredients like chestnut, celeriac and mushroom lend a comforting, autumnal feel. A lot of effort has gone into this plate of food. An unpeeled confit garlic clove garnish took away from the dish’s otherwise elegant and high end presentation. It’s worth noting that crockery and cutlery is of the highest quality, and a great deal of care has gone into showcasing these dishes.
A misunderstanding of a recent article I wrote for Broadsheet was that I was somehow rallying against the practice of restaurants charging extra for sides to main courses. My qualm lies not with the pricing, but more to do with the lack of creativity in serving a simply grilled steak and asking the diner to match the flavours of the sides with it. This is the chef’s job, and it should be an opportunity to showcase what they do best; conceive of textural and flavour combinations, and deliver on them in harmony. Lucia did so here, and when delivered to this level, makes charging $56 for a main course all the more palatable for the modern diner.
Less successful was my chosen main. What read interestingly as “pork rib, golden crumb, grape, fennel agrodolce & creme fraiche” arrived more as an imposing cotoletta, overshadowing the sauces beneath like a Star Destroyer approaching Tatooine. This dish was unfortunately quite greasy and unpleasant to eat, the “agrodolce” salsa far too sweet, the ramekin of creme fraiche on the side an unnecessary afterthought. (edit; a photo of the dish online shows the creme fraiche neatly piped onto the cotoletta and garnished attractively, so it was disappointing to receive an unfinished version of the dish).
A drizzle of flavoured green oil around the edge of the plate only compounded the oiliness of a dish crying out desperately for some crunch or lightness to alleviate things. A handful of shredded cabbage and fresh apple would go some ways to rescuing this, but my feeling is that an already inherently fatty cut like this bone-in pork chop is not well served by being crumbed and fried.
For dessert, a dish so good that any prior missteps are almost forgiven, and something I will certainly be returning to Lucia to eat again. Listed only as “chocolate, bourbon & coffee”, what sounds like a Jim Jarmusch film is actually Lucia’s version of tiramisu. Swiss meringue is skillfully carved into a rose-like spiral, then gently bruleed to brown and set. Inside, a whipped chocolate cremeux is anchored by a light sponge base and a satin cream semifreddo. The theatre is escalated as a coffee and bourbon sauce is poured into the top of the meringue, cascading down the dish in perfect circles like freshly melted snow gliding down a glacial tributary. Stunning to look at, the dish eats incredibly well, almost impossibly light and not oversweet. It’s not an exaggeration to say that this is Michelin star calibre pastry work, and a dish the team at Lucia should be incredibly proud of.
Complimentary limoncello arrives upon presentation of the bill, a civilised stomach settler after a rich and indulgent meal. It’s typical of the thoughtful and attentive service we received at Lucia, where despite a few execution missteps from the kitchen, I had a very enjoyable experience. I’m not sure yet that Lucia will be able to contend with Gimlet, Reine, Rockpool and the other lux platinum AMEX playgrounds, but there’s enough here to suggest that it might.
Lucia
11 Eastern Rd, South Melbourne VIC 3205
(03) 9765 6444
Love this review, such an enjoyable read. A well written assessment of a dining experience.