Goodbye Jamie’s Italian. hello peach-coloured dining room where the lumens are low but the volume and atmosphere are high.
Asian$$
According to the boffins at NASA, one light-year is the distance that light travels in a single Earth year: roughly 9.5 trillion kilometres. (Which makes the word, incidentally, an excellent surname for space ranger and Toy Story protagonist, Buzz Lightyear.)
Light Years, meanwhile, is a modern Asian “bar and diner” that opened in Byron Bay in 2017. One then became many with openings in Noosa, Newcastle, Burleigh Heads and the Gold Coast soon following. In April, Perth became the newest member of the family after Light Years owners Kim Stephen, James Sutherland and Robbie Oijvall came to town and resurrected the old Jamie’s Italian site as the group’s sixth outpost.
Mosey on in off William Street and be treated to a spunky, conspicuously designed room where the chairs, tables and banquette cushions are bouncy of curve; the windows of Heritage-listed Mitchells Building are dressed in gauzy curtains; and much of the space is picked out in shades of peach, something of a signature colour for brand Light Years. In the low light of the night, these warm pastel shades give glasses of white wine that Lucozade-y, orange hue synonymous with skin-contact wines. Or at least they do if you’re seated at the horseshoe-shaped bar: the de facto naughty (or silly) corner to put diners bold enough to show up without a reservation.
Despite opening five months ago, Light Years looks and sounds like a restaurant that’s still in its honeymoon period, even on a Tuesday. The space can seat 200 and almost every one of those seats is filled by someone dressed with intent and bopping part of their body to the loud house soundtrack. Staff in camel-coloured aprons dart here and there like ping pong balls. While the service isn’t exactly what I’d call well-drilled, the waiters are (mostly) well-intentioned, enthusiastic and give you the sense that they want to help: the inverse of po-faced hosts who act with the properness of fine dining maitre d’s, yet look as enthusiastic as your average totem pole when greeting guests at the door.
Still, standoffish welcomes aren’t enough to kill the vibe of tables enthusiastically ripping into contemporary pan-Asian hits alongside fun-time cocktails with names that reference Gen Z culture. Concoctions such as the Instant Crush, perhaps: a tall, rum-powered potion giddy with coconut richness and a whisper of chilli. Just the thing for plump prawn toast triangles coated in black and white sesame seeds. Pork belly bao – here presented as a DIY plate containing four buns, baby cos lettuce leaves, sriracha mayo and slabs of pig in a loose chilli caramel – is nothing new, but its winning combination of salty, sweet and spicy is still impossible to deny.
Special fried rice is straight out of the gutsy, more-more-more school of wok cookery. Witness a steaming bowl of smoky, charred medium-grain rice seeded with omelette, hunks of snow pea and prawn, plus a tiny saucer of blitzed ginger, chilli and garlic: an add-it-yourself condiment the kitchen calls the “LY flavour bomb”. A pleasant jumble of raw tuna with Japanese all-sorts is accompanied by chunky cassava crackers.
While some of the menu’s more adventurous creations can delight – that’d be the Vietnamese coffee pannacotta topped with a salty-sweet cereal that would cause havoc if ever allowed near a breakfast table – this is a kitchen that feels most at home cooking crowd-pleasing favourites rather than lesser-known dishes. The Chinese favourite of smashed cucumber, for one, typically casts black vinegar in a supporting role. Here, the heavy-handed application of the vinegar turns what is usually a refreshing cold dish into more of an assertive pickle.
If you were flying and requested a low-fat in-flight meal, strands of shredded papaya and carrot in a bright, limey dressing would make you happy. I’m not convinced, though, that the dish flies as either a Thai-style som tum (papaya salad) or Vietnamese pickle: the two dishes, I think, it’s inspired by or trying to emulate. Clunky (and expensive) har gow prawn dumplings wrapped in thick dough have little of the elegance found in some of the city’s better versions. Green Goddess sauce, lime and mint strike me as odd condiments to serve with cumin lamb skewer pancakes.
So how then to summarise Light Years? While some will write it off as yet another Instagrammable dining room covering the same territory as most other modern Asian eateries in Australia, a not-so Old Man Yells at Cloud Ear Mushroom take would be to consider Light Years at face value. That is: a perky restaurant-slash-club where what you wear and what you share on social media is just as important as what you eat.
Light Years isn’t here to take Asian food to infinity or beyond, but to whisk the space shuttle to a destination that’s approachable and fun. It does its job well. This William Street newcomer won’t be everyone’s cup of jasmine tea, but for those looking for dinner and a show, it’s a fun ride: even on a school night.
The low-down
Atmosphere: a perky modern Asian restaurant and bar that’s ready to party whenever you are.
Go-to dishes: prawn toast, pork belly bao buns.
Drinks: Fun cocktails designed for partygoers rather than booze nerds, backed by a good cross-section of hip, of-the-moment wines and Asian alcohols.
Cost: about $190 for two people, excluding 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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Max Veenhuyzen is a journalist and photographer who has been writing about food, drink and travel for national and international publications for more than 20 years. He reviews restaurants for the Good Food Guide.