James Squire Brewhouse, Sydney

There's nothing quite like the drama of a steak knife thrust vertically into your main.

We'd returned to James Squire Brewhouse for upmarket pub grub washed down with ales. The meals aren't cheap here, with median prices at about $27.00, but that seems to be the standard pricing schedule along King Street Wharf.

There's an element of blokey classiness about the place. There are beer-related quotes painted near the bathroom, but then there are also distinguished looking Chesterfield lounges inside. There are pool tables and foosball down the back, but also an abundance of gleaming wood finishings (the floorboards, the bar, the indoor tables and chairs).

Outside there's a picnic barbecue type feel. We sit on sturdy outdoor wooden chairs but the tables have an disconcerting sticky residue that even adheres to our serviettes.


Half shell scallops $17.50
cooked in garlic butter and served with tomato and coriander salsa

Things start fairly well. An entree of scallops on half shells are fragrant, cooked to a delicate moistness in a bubbling mass of melted garlic butter.


350gm Black Angus rump $29.50
served on roasted chat potatoes with grilled King prawn and jus

The Black Angus rump is cooked as requested, except our table server doesn't distinguish between the medium rare and the well-done version during their distribution, and each person gets the other's. The inadvertent swap isn't realised til they are each half-way through by which time it is all too late.


500gm grain-fed T-bone steak $31.00
with steak fries and Bearnaise sauce

Veruca Salt enjoys her grain-fed T-bone steak, an enormous slab of meat that could have come straight off a brontosaurus and landed on a Flintstones car roof. The grill marks are a little burnt in areas though and the Bearnaise sauce, a congealing mass of fluorescent yellow, looks like it has seen better days.


Crumbed veal schnitzel $20.00
Milk-fed veal served on steak fries and red wine jus

The veal schnitzel is a definite winner though. The thin layer of meat is tender, moist and juicy. A golden coat of batter is full of crunch.

I share mine with J in exchange for half his rack of pork ribs. Just as well, as things turn out.


Pork ribs full rack $30.00
With smokey bbq sauce and steak fries

The full rack of pork ribs, violently punctuated with a steak knife, arrives twenty minutes after the first main is brought out. There'd been a miscommunication between our table server and the kitchen. An incorrect dish is sent back and although the ribs eventually arrive, we notice even a smallest apology doesn't (not even a "sorry about the wait").

Even more disappointing, the ribs are bland. Barely warm barbecue sauce (tangy and fruity in a way that doesn't agree with J) has been slathered over plain cooked ribs. Generous though they are in size, J and I are both left yearning for that caramelised satisfaction of burnt smoky marinade getting all over your fingers.

We move on for dessert, up the wharf to the Lindt Cafe in Darling Harbour. Happiness is a steaming cup of mix-it-yourself dark hot chocolate chasing rich decadent spoonfuls of the pistachio berry dacquoise.


James Squire Brewhouse
22 The Promenade, King St Wharf, Sydney
Tel: +61 (02) 8270 7999

15% surcharge on Sundays and public holidays.

Related GrabYourFork posts:
James Squire Brewhouse, Aug 2006
James Squire Brewhouse, Feb 2005