Play the Food Critic with Sage’s ‘Taste & Test’

This year, Sage Dining Rooms welcomed one of Australia’s most respected young chefs, James Viles, as Group Chef for HARVAC. Injecting his signature paddock to plate philosophy into their kitchen, diners can expect seasonal dishes from Viles that boast local produce from our diverse region.

While Viles has conjured a brand-new menu with his team, Sage’s signature ‘Taste & Test’ dining experience was a tradition not to be lost. Throughout April, on Wednesdays and Thursdays over lunch and dinner, Sage invites diners to critique and give feedback on their menu using a provided score card. This is offered for a reasonable $85pp for 5-courses.

From the results, the team will decide which items will resurface on the permanent menu.

For a foodie like myself, this experience posed the perfect opportunity to try a new way of tasting food that was fun, and offered an interesting outcome. Given the limited time range to experience the ‘Taste & Test’, I jumped online to make a booking for myself and a group of my friends.

On arrival, we were met with a waiter and taken to our seats. Our score cards were already placed in front of each seat with a provided pencil. They had blank ratings to mark out of ten, and five lines with a positive and negative symbol beside them. Here, we were to write what we did and didn’t like about each dish, as briefed by our helpful waitress.

Below, beverage, service and experience also had to be rated out of ten.

To help us gauge how we should rate each dish, our waitress told us a dish that averaged a score of seven or lower would not make next season’s menu, while anything with 8 or higher would most likely be featured. Food item alterations were also possible, depending on feedback.

As a complimentary starter, the fail-safe bread and butter was placed in front of us. Yes, it looked like ordinary bread, however we were told by our waitress that in fact, it had a rather interesting backstory. The loaf was actually baked with mother culture rather than yeast, a prized possession that Viles has held close to his heart for seven years, even using it at other restaurants. While we couldn’t give it a score out of ten (even though we wish we could), it was interesting to get our first glimpse of his cooking ethos being brought to life.

The first dish to critique was a spanner crab chawanmushi with dashi and fried garlic, which was further explained to us as a Japanese savoury custard.

Each mouthful was a delicious creamy texture, which met flavours of burnt butter, sweet crab, pumpkin seeds, dashi, and fried garlic. Once the bowl was empty, we took our first steps as food critics. Rating the dish 7/10 on account of the fried garlic being too overpowering, we agreed it was a pretty interesting dish.

Secondly, we tried pine mushrooms with smoked yogurt, braised kohl rabi and mustard oil, an absolute winner. Head Chef, Cory Finch, shared that his team foraged for the mushrooms the night before- right here in Canberra.

The smokiness of the yogurt had a perfect intensity, bringing out the flavours of the mushrooms and creating an all-round 8/10 dish.

Up next, Bass Strait octopus with potatoes, warragal and bell peppers.

Having sourced the octopus from Sydney earlier that week, it was tender and perfectly cooked, alongside the potatoes covered in the most delicious sauce. With only positive comments, it was a 9/10.

Lamb rump with heirloom carrots, garlic porridge and olive caramel came to complete our selection of savoury dishes- a generous serve of lamb, perched over porridge, with olive caramel drizzled on top. As the lamb was overcooked and the porridge was almost non-existent, this was my first opportunity to play the ‘harsh critic’. Rating it only a 6/10, I knew I would not come back for this dish, and shared my constructive criticism on the score card.

By the time we made it to the sweet stuff, I was feeling pretty confident in my new-found food critic abilities. Not being a massive sweet-tooth, this was going to have to really wow me to get a score above seven. A golden kiwi and cocoa ice cream sanga graced our table. Created with the intention of being eaten by hand, it showed off the creative and fun side to Viles’ cooking. The layer of kiwi jam in-between the base was sweet and delicious, paired with the cocoa, while not being too rich. My final rating for it was a 7/10. Eating this treat with our hands didn’t really work for me, however it wasn’t too rich, which is often a turn off for me.

As we finished off our final dish of the night and compared notes, it was interesting to see how they differed slightly. We did, however, have the same consensus that the lamb was our least favourite dish.

The overall experience of rating each element and the creativity of the dishes that Viles and his team placed in front of us sparked interesting conversation on our table. The result was an enjoyable night that differed from our regular dining occasions. We had no choice but to rate the overall experience a 10/10. We also agreed that the staff were incredibly helpful and insightful, scoring them a 10/10 as well.

I think that above anything else, we were all interested to see which of the dishes we disliked and loved would feature on next season’s menu.

Whether you just want to give the dishes a try, or are busting the play the food critic, this dining experience was a fun and exciting way to try out new foods and experience something quite out of the ordinary.