Whether it’s meat, dairy, olive oil, fruit and vegetables, seafood, eggs, beer or wine, the new Caveau menu shows off the bounty that can be sourced within the region. KATE McILWAIN reports.
If you eat at Caveau these days, chef Simon Evans says about 70 per cent of the food on your plate will have been grown, made or sourced from the Illawarra and surrounds.
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With his business partner Tom Chiumento, Evans bought the celebrated restaurant from its founders – their bosses – in January.
After 12 years and the same number of coveted Good Food Guide Chef Hats, Caveau’s founders Peter and Nicola Sheppard gave the venue the reputation as the region’s best restaurant.
Taking over, the two young chefs were keen to maintain this standing, but also knew they would eventually make some changes to make it their own.
Upping the use of local produce in an effort to pitch the Illawarra as a food region was their first order of business and – six months on – the move has been bearing plenty of fruit.
“It depends on the dish, and the menu – but realistically I think 70 per cent of our food is local,” Evans says.
“No one else is really showing local produce to the extent we are and there’s a bit of a pride thing, being from this area and saying we’re going to show off what this area can do.”
Aside from local pride, he says the pair has relished being able to spend money with food suppliers within the region.
“If we can buy something that’s the same quality from here, or buy it somewhere further north, why wouldn’t we get it here?” he says.
“Hopefully that investment means they can progress, get better and they might come to dinner here, so it kind of all works.”
“There’s also environmental factors – and it’s actually just really amazing food that works for us.”
Read more: Illawarra food co-ops master art of business
For Wollongong-born Chiumento, he hopes Caveau’s “inherently local” approach might eventually open up a food tourism industry – with the city’s growing number of high-quality restaurants a gateway – akin to other regional centres like Mudgee, Orange or the Adelaide surrounds.
“I would love to see us having a supermarket or produce store of some kind that only sells local produce,” he says, raving about some of the goods the two men have been able to find.
“South Coast oysters are some of the best in Australia, and for the past few months, after the Febraury rains its been really good because all the rivers got cleaned out. Shoalhaven oysters have never been better.”
Perhaps the most special find has been Gerringong’s Heartwood Farm, which grows finger limes: the native fruit filled with tiny caviar-like bursts of sweet citrus.
“I went down and picked the first lot that we got from them, and I was absolutely shocked to see how many they had growing,” he says.
For Evans, a recent visit to the South Coast Dairy co-op, in Berry, was proof of why working with regional suppliers works best.
“South Coast Dairy is an amazing producer – it’s a co-op of different farms which are all within 15kms,” he says.
“So there’s a really short space between the farms and the factory where the products are made. It’s a group of farmers, who are in it for their own good – they’re not getting screwed over because they do the whole thing, from farming to delivery.”
“Another example is we’ve got a guy in Dapto who grows our veggies and he’ll pick it that morning or the morning before.”
“Something from Sydney might be picked three days before, and we get it two days later, so that’s five days by the time we get it. We’re getting something delivered more or less on the day – so even the shelf life and freshness is better.
“We can’t see a negative to doing this.”
Hesitating, Mr Chiumento points out that there is an extraordinary amount of extra work involved in working with “20 different suppliers, instead of just having one”.
“But at the same time, it’s awesome to be calling our suppliers, talking to them about what’s best.
‘’Our veg guy came just now and was asking like ‘are the lettuce okay, do you want us to change them a bit, are these flowers really nice, do you want different ones?’.
“To have a connection that’s so direct, there’s so much control over the food we’re using.”
This has resulted in a change to the way the chefs craft their meals, with seasonal availability dictating Caveau’s changing menu more than ever.
“We don’t write a menu based on ideas we come up with – we write it based on what we can get,” Mr Chiumento said.
“It’s good, because it forces you to be more creative, and it also forces you to go out and look for more things – you’re always trying to find new suppliers.”
For instance, a yabby dish that has been featuring recently on the menu was built around roasted butter lettuce.
“When you’re at a fine dining restaurant, who ever has lettuce?,” Mr Chiumento says.
Other recent creations have included a “milk and honey” dish, showing off different textures and flavours of South Coast Dairy products and local flowers and honey; and meals always start with a bread roll brushed with Kangaroo Valley olive oil and freshly house-made butter.
Aside from the produce shift, the two young men have also funked up Caveau’s playlist – getting rid of the hallmark classical instrumental tunes – hung work from local artists on the walls and are soon planning a change to the long-standing degustation structure.
“Fine dining now is not what fine dining was 10 years ago – it’s so much more relaxed, and I think a lot of people have come and been quite shocked at how we’ve relaxed things a lot,” Mr Chiumento says.
“We don’t like that overly formal experience, it’s dated, and no one wants to feel like they have to whisper.
“We want people to come here and have a good time.”
But what hasn’t changed is their goal of maintaining – or hopefully even adding to – the restaurant’s prized Chef’s Hat.
“We definitely want to push for two hats, not only for ourselves but also for the region,” he said.
“Wollongong should be a food destination in its own right, the region is ready for it because we have more food venues now that I think people travelling here would be really surprised by.”
Caveau suppliers include:
- South Coast Dairy, Berry
- Dapto Community Farm
- Poodle and the Hen, Pheasants Nest
- Maugers Meats, Burrawang/Robertson
- Heartwood Farm, Gerringong
- Harley and John Seafood, Fairy Meadow
- Pecora Dairy, Robertson
- Glenbernie Apple Shack, Darkes Forest
- Karelah Berry Farm, Dapto
- Coolangatta Winery, Shoalhaven Heads
- Tertini Wines, Southern Highlands
- Five Barrels brewery, Wollongong
- Artemis, Sutton Forest
- Schoolhouse Cheese, Gerringong
- Kangaroo Valley Olive Oil
- Yelverton Truffle Farm, Robertson
- Porkery Hill meats, Nowra Hill