La Grillade
Crows Nest, Sydney

Years ago, when I was hosting the Midday show on the Nine Network, we did it live every day for 90 minutes from noon until 1.30 p.m. from the Channel Nine Sydney headquarters in Willoughby on Sydney’s North Shore.

 

Daily, I would either take the limo back to the city and have Japanese shabu shabu at Shiki – down at The Rocks – or stay on the north side of the bridge and go to La Grillade in Crow’s Nest.

 

I ended up having so many lunches there after my programme finished that the boss of Channel Nine, David Leckie expressed concern that I was seen dining alone in what was regarded as a TV executives’ branch office. He offered to join me. I said I’d rather eat alone. He said he’d get  the gorgeous Jo Beth Taylor to join me. I said, ungraciously that would be worse than eating alone. But, having lunched with her years later in Melbourne, I take that back.

 

I explained that I enjoyed solo dining after the Midday show. I would read books and other research for the next day’s programme or I would answer viewers’ mail or even scribble notes for one of my strangest jobs : writing a lonely hearts column ( Dear Dezza) for the Women’s Weekly. It paid a poultice and made a dream come true. I finally got to give somebody three words of advice: “Get a life”.

 

La Grillade was run by one of the most beautiful, most vivacious and most professional restaurateurs in Australia. Her name was (is) Lennie. God, how many hearts did she break. She has since retired and her brother and business partner, David, still runs it. So does the energetic Chrissie.

 

La Grillade is a bit old-fashioned but that doesn’t turn me off. The name may, for some. My dining partner that night is vegetarian. I told her where we were going and she asked why take her to a “chop house”.  It’s not. Sure, they have a big meat menu with quality steaks but they also serve chicken and duck and fish. And heaps of vegetables.

 

The atmosphere is great. And a feeling that these people know food and know how to serve it consistently. And it has a good wine list.

 

My biggest La Grillade memory – from the 1990s – could have ended in disaster. A regular diner, an acquaintance, suddenly turned beetroot red at the next table and collapsed on the floor.  His heart had stopped.

 

Lennie got me some ice cubes which I placed on his forehead and neck after ripping off his tie and tearing his shirt open. Then, as an amateur lifesaver, despite years in the St. John’s Ambulance as a kid, I proceeded to thump him on the chest.

 

Admittedly, I broke a couple of his ribs but I got him breathing again and got him to hospital in an ambulance. He lived. You couldn’t blame the food at La Grillade for that one.

 

It reminded me of that Charles Dickens line:

“It wasn’t the wine Mr. Snodgrass. It was the salmon.”

 

On this occasion at La Grillade I suspect it was the wine.

 

December 14, 2005