Take three: after Cantonese and modern Asian menus failed to resonate, Perry’s multi-storey Double Bay site will be overhauled as Gran Torino, an Italian bar and restaurant focused on fresh pasta, grilled meat and seafood.
Neil Perry’s Song Bird restaurant will close less than a year after its grand Double Bay launch and three months after the Cantonese menu shifted to a broader modern Asian pitch. Its demise is part of a massive shake-up at the Bay Street mega-venue, where Perry is ditching Chinese and relaunching the venue as an Italian restaurant.
Gran Torino will open on August 9, after Song Bird serves its last wonton on August 3. On the ground floor will be a bar focused on share plates and Italian drinks. Upstairs will be a 100-seat restaurant with a selection of antipasti, fresh pastas, produce-driven mains with grilled meat, and classic Italian desserts.
Perry’s executive chef, Richard Purdue, who has plenty of experience with Italian cuisine running the kitchen at Rosetta, will oversee Gran Torino alongside Ervin Mumujesi, who is currently head chef at Margaret, Perry’s popular two-hatted steak and seafood-focused restaurant on the next block.
Perry has been vocal in recent months about the reluctance of diners to pay premium prices for Chinese food, thinking it should be “cheap and cheerful”.
“With Song Bird, we missed the mark by creating a three-level Chinese restaurant in Double Bay. Now, we’ve got the size right over two levels, and – just as importantly – acoustics that have finally been tamed, we’re ready to move forward into a new future,” said Perry in a statement.
“The change to Gran Torino will be a better fit with Margaret, and the more approachable menu and laidback setting will have people wanting to return time and time again for drinks, casual bites, and celebrations.”
Speaking exclusively to the Herald, Perry added that Gran Torino’s menu will sweep dishes such as pumpkin tortellini, Roman-style tripe and a dessert nod to Torta di Verona. “Richard is probably the best Australian chef cooking Italian food, and Ervin is just a gun”
The dark timbers and modern finishes of Song Bird’s design also lend themselves to an Italian restaurant, said Perry, so the space will require only a “bit of a polish” rather than a full makeover.
After the initial success of Margaret and its sibling venues Next Door and Baker Bleu, Perry seemingly couldn’t put a foot wrong in Double Bay. But the next step in the “Perryfication” of the exclusive suburb proved to be more challenging. Perry and his team splashed $13 million on the four-level Neville Gruzman building on Bay Street that housed Song Bird and Bobbie’s jazz bar.
Last month Perry closed Bobbie’s, a joint venture with New York-based Australian bar tsar Linden Pride, and relinquished the top floor of Song Bird, which was used for functions. Perry said at the time: “Song Bird is absolutely not closing.”
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