Must-order lamb, bouncy gnudi and a cassata for the ages from pastry chef Lauren Eldridge are among the compelling reasons to visit Osteria Mucca, the third new venture from the Continental Deli crew.
15/20
Italian$$
Let me take this opportunity, firstly, to apologise to my mum for the time I brined a whole pig’s head in her vegetable crisper without permission. “Surprise!” In my defence, pig’s-head charcuterie wasn’t that easy to come by back then. Today? I’d just go to Osteria Mucca and order the coppa di testa.
Shaved thinly, strips of pig’s ear throughout, it has a persistent intensity held back by cloves, nutmeg and a crack of pepper, a gold-rimmed plate serving as a reminder that this, too, is luxury.
These jolts are everywhere at Osteria Mucca, one of three new openings – along with seafood-focused Mister Grotto and vegetable-led Flora – joining Continental Deli on Australia Street. If it’s not coppa di testa, it might be the cotechino, a puck of gutsy, rubbly pork sausage checked just enough with salsa verde, horseradish and a colourful cluster of mustard fruits. Lentils turned through a sticky-sweet jus surround it.
These are the butcher’s cuts, so to speak, chosen to reflect the site’s history; before it was a solicitor’s office and later cafe 212 Blu, this was a butcher shop. It’s this period that co-owners Elvis Abrahanowicz, Sarah Doyle and Joe Valore (the trio are also of Porteno and Bastardo fame) have tapped for its next life – making a feature of the chipped tiles, breaking down whole animals – before dressing the dining room with bottle-green banquettes, chequerboard flooring and white tablecloths.
For the Italian thread they’ve signed Berlin-born Janina Allende to run the kitchen, fresh off the head-chef gig at Pellegrino 2000 in Surry Hills. A couple of scrubbed-up cow mosaics inspired the name (mucca means “cow” in Italian) but it’s also something of a misnomer: most of the time there are only three cuts of beef, with the remainder of the beast confined to the “latteria” section.
Here, among the crunch and comfort of whey-braised, parmesan-crumbed fennel, the milkiest dish is a mountain of warm, house-made ricotta, served on a vintage plate with a splash of olive oil. Thick and wildly creamy from a dash of creme fraiche, it’s another reason to add a bread basket, filled with parmesan grissini, thin “carta di musica” crackers, and ciabatta rolls.
Follow the cow, like I did the first time, and suddenly you’re splitting the $150 bistecca alla Fiorentina when you really shouldn’t be. Partly because it’s a shame laying out that much for a steak then finding it warm instead of hot, unevenly finished, and dropped off without a sense of ceremony or a word of explanation. And partly because the lamb is just too good to pass up.
Order that and it’ll come as an assortment of the day’s cuts, taken from a whole lamb and prepared according to its needs. That means carved rack, grilled until blushing, the fat grassy and sweet; shoulder rolled around Mediterranean herbs, slow-cooked until yielding; and arrosticini, an Abruzzesi specialty of skewered lamb, cooked hard and fast.
The city’s best mixed grill? Waiters, wearing all white, black ties and an enabling air, know it. As do, it turns out, the ones next door: pre-game at Mister Grotto and you might leave with a handwritten cheat sheet. Lamb plate: “MUST”, in all caps. Salty baccala mantecato, finished with bottarga, on hot garlicky toasts? Ditto.
The call on the vinegary eggplant, marinated in coriander and garlic, might be because vegetables are so few and far between – or maybe it’s because the leaf salad, weighed down by oil, is so lacking in acid. This is assured cooking but it’s definitely not light, so it stands as a missed opportunity for balance.
Ramp up the acid and it’d be a match for the hand-rolled pappardelle turned through buttery chicken-liver ragu, a gorgeous spin on a Marcella Hazan recipe made even better with some pepper from the metre-long grinder. But it’s the gnudi that best shows off Allende’s handiwork: house ricotta and semolina is kneaded into dumplings that are full of bounce, each topped with fried sage and lemon zest and slick with brown butter. MUST.
Pastry chef Lauren Eldridge’s cassata is in all caps, too. Spoon into the decorative Sicilian cake and a shell of pistachio marzipan and candied fruits gives way to herbal, Liquore Strega-soaked sponge and chocolate-flecked ricotta, all finished with fondant lacework worthy of North Carolina’s annual National Gingerbread House Competition. One for the ages.
Meanwhile, the room is a pleasure to be in. The quarters are close, candles flicker. Behind the bar, staff can stir down a Martinez as well as section waiters can speak to a wine list that goes all-in on Italy, with a reserve section dedicated to terroir-driven makers including Arianna Occhipinti and Elisabetta Foradori. It’s slim pickings under $90 but you can’t accuse the list of lacking a point of view.
And that’s what makes this strip so compelling. Each venue is its own thing, uncompromising and fully realised. Coupled with boutique rooms upstairs, the Continental hub is primed to capitalise on Newtown’s transformation from student haunt to a suburb where hatted restaurants are as common as the crystal shops and Thai takeaways. Somewhere, you might just take your mum for pig’s-head charcuterie.
The lowdown
Atmosphere: Grown-up, candlelit Italian with old-world charm and a glint in the eye
Go-to dishes: Baccala mantecato ($25); gnudi with brown butter and sage ($36); agnello alla griglia ($68); cassata ($28)
Drinks: Producer-driven, all-Italian wines, made the old-fashioned way, with a skew to textural reds and barolo. Grappa and amaro to finish
Cost: About $200 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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David Matthews is a food writer and editor, and co-editor of The Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide 2025.
