Restaurant review: Red Hook, Brisbane's buzzy place with great cocktails

Natascha Mirosch

October 16, 2014

I leave with a sauce-smudged shirt and salt 'n' vinegar fingers. The be-suited folk who are my dining neighbours on a bright Tuesday with just a hint in the air of the bitumen-melting summer to come, don't give a damn that Red Hook's menu makes for messy knife and forkless eating. Or that it's counter service. They have swapped the office and al desko sandwich lunches for Brooklyn Lager and dripping burgers.

It's been barely two months since Bonnie Shearston and Tom Sanceau, (who also own Public Bar and Restaurant in George Street), opened this relaxed bar/diner in Gresham Lane in the CBD. It's been pretty much standing room only since.

Admittedly that's partly down to there being so few chairs and tables, but also because Sanceau and Shearston have tapped into the overwhelmingly popular American food trend. Rather than playing follow the leader with a "deep south, ribs 'n' wings" menu (although the latter are on the menu and quite delicious too), Red Hook takes its cues from New York. Brooklyn to be specific, with the name lifted from a neighbourhood famous for its street food vendors and producers.

Red Hook is a study in simplicity; a handful of folding chairs and tables set out under an awning in the lane serviced by a small bar. Shearston and Sanceau have a strong bar service background, (they were the former owners of Canvas in Woolloongabba), and in addition to a neat little craft beer list (Brooklyn Lager and IPA, Stone and Wood Pacific Ale, Blue Star Wheat Beer and more), there's a collection of cheeky cocktails like the Harlem Hard Shake (bourbon, chocolate, caramel, peanut butter ice cream), the "Lagerita" (tequila, agave syrup, lime, lager), and the "Dr Pepper Depth Charge" (amaretto, over-proof rum, lager).

The menu is concise and unpretentious; drinking food. Burgers are worth a grease spot or two, the roughly minced beef patty chunky and served pleasingly medium rare, to allow its juices to mingle with a "secret sauce" atop sunflower-yellow melted cheese. I suspect, from the familiar spicy number toothpicked to our burger, Red Hook's pickles come from the McClure pickle jar, which is no bad thing – they are crunchy and lip-tingling with chilli. They also come battered and crisply deep-fried along with other pickled bits, with the slight oiliness of the golden nuggets casing relieved by the juicy burst of acid inside. Speaking of fries, shoestring salt and vinegar fries are good enough on their own – and don't really need the bacon ketchup we ordered.

Famous in New York's neighbour state Maine, a lobster roll has its sides neatly trimmed and toasted, and is generously filled with sweet discs of lobster in a creamy mayo, garlanded with microherbs. It loses a point on this occasion for heavy handed salting (OK maybe just half a point), but despite that it is still very good and I suspect will be on the menu for the foreseeable future.

Duck tacos depart the US entirely, singing with coriander and an alto hit of chilli heat, along with Asian coleslaw within lightly toasted soft tacos. The waiter tells us he is despatched daily to Burlington Barbecue in the Valley on his bike to pick up the roasted ducks for the tacos.

As well as serving lunchtime workers, Red Hook's kitchen is open until midnight, perfectly filling the yawning gap in the CBD that exists between full blown restaurant and kebab joint.

Incidentally, the ever dynamic Shearston and Sanceau, never ones to rest on their laurels, are working on another venue just around the corner in Creek Street. Stay tuned.