Firegrill Sydney — Restaurant in Sydney

I chose this place to celebrate my friend’s birthday and I’m glad she liked this place and it didn’t disappoint.

We were seated near the kitchen which had got the mirror facing and a candlelight on the table. I was instantly thrilled at how great the atmosphere was at this place. Amazed by the decor in the room especially the crystal chandelier. I just couldn’t keep my eyes away from it as I was seated opposite it. What a delight.

The servers were attentive to our table and took orders with care. Since this place is well-known for the steak, we had wagyu tenderloin done in medium rare. The steak was cooked to perfection to my liking, which was juicy and flavorful in every right way, complemented well with fried onions (I reckoned) and pumpkin sauce. I just couldn’t get enough of it as we were sharing it.

We were served with complimentary breads with pumpkin soup before the steak was served and we loved it. The crust of the breads were simply flaky and they were soft. The pumpkin soup and butter just topped it off.

For the starter we had seared scallops, with cauliflower purée and boudin noir. As for the mains, we had prawn linguini with capers, lemon, chilli and onion frites and pan seared duck breast with root vegetables, target beets, beetroot purée and orange jus.

We loved every bit of the prawn linguini as it’s flavorsome and nicely done. However, we didn’t like the duck breast as we were not used to having sweet sauce (from the beetroot) with duck meat. We still preferred the savory sauce which is Chinese traditional. Other than that, I found the meat a tad too hard for me. It’d be better if it’s cut into slices and also with the meat more tender.

As for the dessert, we went greedy to have two. We had Eton Mess, which is a combination of crispy meringue, crème chantilly, fresh strawberries and strawberry sauce. I didn’t like it as I’m not a fan of meringue, as I always find it overly sweet and flavorless. We ordered it for its instagrammable presentation and we could barely finish it.

The second dessert - chocolate ganache didn’t disappoint. As I’m a fan of dark chocolate, I quite enjoyed this dessert. Even though it’s not as nicely presented as Eton Mess, the content is was rich with dark chocolate flavor and I enjoyed the silky texture of it. The sesame toppings and orange slices added extra exquisite flavor to it.

The great ambience of this place had made the overall dining experience much more pleasant compared to the service. Our steak and mains were served altogether instead of serving them one after another one was finished. Hence, the food turned cold quick before we could finish one as we took some time to take photos of the food. To make it even worse, it’s a cold rainy night. Asides from that, the dessert plates were not clean. We had asked for a change twice and we still got oily plates. A big...

WORST SERVICE IN SYDNEY - would have loved to write about the food at this restaurant but sadly my experience didn’t get me that far. Chosen for dinner after a long day of travel, I was “greeted” by a miserable waiter who hastily showed me to my table. Why he sat me right on top of another group when there was an empty seat right next to it I don’t know. Perhaps he was looking to conserve energy…. When I sat down on the table that afforded me some personal space, the same waiter came over and moved the fake “candle” and glass with a huff as though it was the biggest inconvenience in the world. He then proceeded to ignore me until one of his colleagues took my order. I was underwhelmed but the limited choices in the menu but chose a steak with some simple changes (no gratin, no jus, with mustard) and a side. A while later our “friend” reappeard with half my meal (the steak, with jus and potato gratin, sans mustard…) and no side. When I asked where the rest of my meal was he said “it’s coming”. 5 minutes later, no side, no mustard. Now I don’t know about you, but I generally like my food served hot, warm at the least. The waitress asked if everything was ok and I told her I’d like the rest of my meal. I got told by the same guy “I said it’s coming”. No apology, nothing. That was the last straw for me, so I left. In my way out this guy proceeded to make a smart arsed comment. Seriously, don’t bother with this place. There are better steak restaurants in close proximity with friendly, professional wait staff and a much better menu. As you can see from the response below, they don’t care. Us customers are a dime a dozen after all. Why would anyone pay for a cold meal served by a rude waiter?? 🙄 Not the first poor service review on...

I understand set menus on really busy days like Valentine's day. I don't endorse it nor enjoy it, but I understand it. What I've never seen is a restaurant take the cookie cutter experience this far: What can only be described as closely spaces speed dating two-seater tables and an extremely limited set drinks menu didn't augur a good night - and those expectations were resoundingly met.

We ordered the only Shiraz on offer, which was house wine by the glass. It could best be described as substandard wine, served too warm.

Starters were reasonable enough, though not as described, and we finished these by 7:15. From then until 8:40 when our mains arrived, we neither received a visit from a waitron, nor could we flag one down. Our empty wine glasses were arranged next to the empty champagne glasses from the sparkling wine we were served at arrival, and were in fact not removed from the table until we got up to pay the bill. We had planned to order two glasses of Cab Sav to see if we could get the taste of tepid Shiraz out of our mouths but the opportunity never came. As our mains were served my wife asked where the sourdough was that was supposed to have been served right up front. The response from the waitress? "Oh, let me see whether you were supposed to get that." This is the point at which we simply gave up.

Dessert took another 40 minutes or so to arrive. And wasn't worth the wait.

Set menus are there to help a restaurant provide decent service in the face of a capacity crowd. If you can't even manage a full restaurant despite taking this concept to the extreme, just don't open on days like these. It really can...