BLACKBOOK IN THE KNOW 5
BLACKBOOK IN THE KNOW 5 6 SEACUTERIE SURFACES 6 6 Toronto’s Buca Osteria & Bar (buca.ca),which opened in October, is a follow-up to executive chef Rob Gentile’s Buca Osteria & Enoteca, a restaurant that catapulted to international renown in 2011, when Jamie Oliver tweeted that his meal there was his favourite of the year. The original Buca is heavy on pork and offal; its new counterpart performs all of the same salumi tricks but with seafood – think smoked halibut, swordfish belly lardo, octopus soppressata and scallop sausage. Seafood charcuterie is already one of the year’s top dining trends, but to find any that is more successfully daring than Gentile’s, diners will have to travel to Michelin two-star Moreno Cedroni’s Anikò (morenocedroni.it/aniko), in Senigallia, Italy, where the avant-garde chef, and one of Milan Expo 2015’s ambassadors, holds court. D O W N U N D E R D E L I G H T S It’s a family affair at the stylish new L’Hotel Gitan restaurant (lhotelgitan.com.au), in Prahran, Melbourne, where siblings Nathalie, Edouard and Antoine are working alongside their celebrity chef father, Jacques Reymond, producing dishes like tea-salt baby beet salad and three- pepper magret of duck. Beetroot appears on the menu, too, at Scott Pickett’s reworked Northcote restaurant, Estelle Bistro (estellebistro. com), where they do a beautiful starter of beetroot-cured salmon and a fine wagyu tartare (above, left). Pickett’s aboutto-open fine diner, ESP, meanwhile, next door to the bistro, will offer only an eight-course chef-selection menu. And still down Victoria way, the team behind Prahran’s popular Hanoi Hannah have just opened Tokyo Tina ( $ tokyotina.com. au, above right). Ramen mavens are racing here for ramen with roasted pork belly, toasted nori and 63-degree egg, in Windsor, an area not short of top-notch noodle bars. 1 2 3 4 4 PILLOW TALK Vital Venice The Italian jewel is shining ever more brightly thanks to a trio of new hotels and an old favourite’s upgrade It’s improbable to imagine another new hotel shoehorning itself into Venice’s cramped and watery milieu,but a trio of ambitious newcomers have done just so, joining some of Europe’s legendary properties in La Serenissima. The 191-key St Regis Venice San Clemente Palace ( 1, stregisvenice. com) is the latest, debuting in a 12th-century monastery, recast by international designers Hirsch Bedner Associates and GA Design, on its namesake island, halfway between the Lido and Giudecca. On an island to the west, Sacca Sessola, the new JW Marriott Venice Resort & Spa (2, marriott.com) woos guests with 250 contemporary rooms and suites designed by Milanese architect Matteo Thun, its own cooking school and the city’s largest spa, all just a quick gondola ride from St Mark’s Square. Back on the Grand Canal in San Polo, the 43-room Hotel L’Orologio Venezia (3, hotelorologiovenezia.com) pays homage to the art of haute horlogerie with inventive watchthemed decor (think quartz flooring and original internal mechanisms in elegant boiserie) as well as a sleek, canal-facing bar. Meanwhile, the renowned Hotel Danieli on Riva degli Schiavoni inaugurates its Wine Suite ( 4, danieliwinesuite.com), a studiously elegant bar that promises a thoroughly comprehensive oenophilic experience with unrivalled views of the city. CLAUDIA WHITEUS PHOTOS CLOCKWISE FROM TOP RIGHT: MARTIN HAAKE (ILLUSTRATION), © ST. REGIS VENICE, © JW MARRIOTT, PAOLO BELVEDERE, ALESSANDRO MOGGI, © TOKYO TINA, DEAN CAMBRAY, RENÉE S. SUEN 44 CENTURION-MAGAZINE.COM CONTACT CENTURION SERVICE FOR BOOKINGS
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