Ormeggio chef Alessandro Pavoni’s Manly venture has a bar, cafe-gelateria and restaurant, Cibaria, serving exciting, saucy carbs and scorched treats.
15/20
Italian$$
Know what the key is to a long-lasting relationship? Spaghetti and meatballs. A particularly well-stuffed banh mi. A 2am meat pie. Messy foods you need to eat with gusto. A close friend of mine reckons if you can split a whole mudcrab with a partner and they hook in with unbridled enthusiasm, you’ve got a keeper. If you find them looking askance at your buttery, crab-covered face, it’s time to move on.
Chef Gianmarco Pardini’s lardo di Colonnata is in the same file. If you haven’t had the pleasure, it’s a Tuscan dish of whipped pork backfat infused with salt, pepper, garlic, thyme and rosemary. Sometimes it’ll be served on a little crostata, other times with a hunk of bread. Here at this Manly newcomer, the moreish spread is served as a thin layer on the plate, accompanied by crisp shards of Sardinian flatbread. One to linger over with an amaro spritz and an understanding partner.
So this is Cibaria, the latest venture from creative director Alessandro Pavoni and the crew behind Ormeggio at The Spit, Osteria Postino in Summer Hill and a’Mare at Crown. It’s quite an undertaking. There’s standalone bar, 55 North, doing a steady trade in 𝄒nduja-washed negronis and lobster rolls. The cafe-gelateria is a destination unto itself; a dedicated function space upstairs is set to cater for big groups. And, of course, there’s the actual restaurant. Altogether, the crew are making a strong case for Manly as a destination beyond the beach.
Local designer Luchetti Krelle captures all the best bits of Australian life by the coast – the space is open, breezy, and feels made to go from surf-to-seat – with real sprezzatura. Tiled floors meet buttery leather and linen banquettes. Marble-topped tables and the generous curves of Daumiller chairs overlook the ocean on one side and the open kitchen ruled by a wood-fire grill on the other. Just the right amount of Italo disco, just the right amount of surf club.
The menu gives generously when it comes to exciting, saucy carbs and scorched treats. Hook straight in and order the puffy, wood-fired pizzette, drenched in so much smoky-sweet sugo you can use it as a dip. Unconventional but delicious serving suggestion: order the squid ink spaghetti tossed with torn-up crab meat, chilli, bread crumbs, parmesan and parsley at the same time. With just the right amount of richness and warmth, and a cool pizzette counterpoint.
Stay on the left-hand side of the carte for a beat if you want to linger over a glass of fizz. Perhaps a serve of raw scallops on the shell, dressed with finger lime, chervil and salmon roe. Or maybe it’ll be raw kingfish, dressed with baby capers, chives and kalamata olives.
Service is two steps ahead. That might be a gentle lead through the menu, or knowing to bring extra bread to clean up the last of a particularly potent puttanesca. It’s much needed for the sauce – a gloriously olive-oily mix of black olives, Olasagasti anchovies, capers and tomato tossed through house-made spaghetti.
Wine service is equally in-tune, finding the perfect by-the-glass option for chargrilled baby artichoke on a bed of lemony chickpea puree, and going the extra mile to dig up a rare Etna grenache to go with sirloin on the bone. (That steak lacks a bit of oomph for me. The smarter order is the lamb scottadito – juicy, rosy, salty and finger-burningly hot cutlets with a sparky salsa verde.)
Ormeggio co-owner and chef Victor Moya is behind the sweets. I love his tricked-up take on a pina colada cocktail – pineapple sorbet, biscuit crumb, rum-soaked candied pineapple bits and freeze-dried coconut sorbet rubble – but it’s pretty hard to look past the gelato. Moya is importing pistachios from Sicily and hazelnuts from Piedmont. There’s a real sweetness and purity to that flavour. Both are also so thick, you can stick a spoon upright and it’ll just stay there like it’s haunted.
Pavoni has a great ability to reflect the neighbourhoods he’s opening in, without falling into the trap of creating cookie-cutter venues. Each place has its own energy and personality – a feat in a world that has a habit of rewarding uniformity. His new venture, Vineria Luisa, is opening on Enmore Road in mid-July but for now, set your sights on the lardo di Colonnata at Cibaria and say it with me: “a plate of fat is for lovers”.
The low-down
Atmosphere: Modern trattoria in a beachy setting that welcomes chic dressing for lunch and bare feet for gelato
Go-to dishes: Charcoal baby artichokes ($24); lardo di Colonnata ($16); spaghetti puttanesca ($36); a scoop of hazelnut gelato ($7.50)
Drinks: Italian-heavy wine list, a decent by-the-glass selection and excellent cocktails care of the bar next door
Cost: About $180 for two, before drinks
Good Food reviews are booked anonymously and paid independently. A restaurant can’t pay for a review or inclusion in the Good Food Guide.
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Myffy Rigby is the former editor of the Good Food Guide.
