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A. Baker

Bryan Martin

Wow, it delivers ... Roasted peach, vanilla yoghurt, rose and pistachio brittle.
Wow, it delivers ... Roasted peach, vanilla yoghurt, rose and pistachio brittle.Melissa Adams

14/20

Modern Australian$$

They don't take bookings, they say, but just rock up and we'll sort you out. This makes me anxious. I know where I'm going is a sparkling-new, super-modern, ironically retro, industrially … I'm running out of adjectives, but I'm struggling.

It's the Generation Y thing to be not bogged down by procedure - when you might change your mind and head to the gym instead of dinner, you don't want to make bookings - but nothing, other than your doctor's happy face after a procedure, gives an older person peace of mind like a rock-solid table for dinner.

Anyway, we rock up about 8pm and we do get a table. Well, it's a bit like garden furniture near the door, but from here we can see the amazing space that is A. Baker, risen literally from the ashes of Flint, even with carbon marks on the concrete wall, which is eerie, yet pretty cool.

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A. Baker is at 15 Edinburgh Avenue, New Acton.
A. Baker is at 15 Edinburgh Avenue, New Acton.Melissa Adams

It's busy and the staff all look fantastic, young and energetic - lots of shaved heads and carefree attitudes. I'm liking this energy. It feels as if you are in the heart of it and, next door, Parlour has its opening party.

I parked under the Palace Electric cinema, where there's this strange post-peak-oil feeling - a Hubbertian world where everyone drives really small cars. My brute can't fit in a space, and a huge lock-up is filled with iron-framed fixed-gear bikes. Upstairs, the Nishi building looks as if someone has spent much time and money at Bunnings' lumber yard and run out of time to use the materials.

So I perch on a backless metal stool as if I'm having brunch in a garden centre and order the food. (My partner has been delayed clearing the school after the fete where our son won a 10-kilogram block of chocolate, and she's probably struggling to get it into her little hatch, which will fit so well in one of those mini car parks.)

Head chef Adam Bantock at A. Baker.
Head chef Adam Bantock at A. Baker.Melissa Adams
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The staff are darting around, but I catch the attention of a waiter - are they still called waiters? - and ask again whether we can get closer to the action with a decent-sized table and maybe a chair with a back.

My knees and back are going, perched here, and there are a couple of tables that look free. But no, he says, all the tables are booked. Booked? That's not fair. Didn't they say no bookings?

The menu has lots going on: a range of charcuterie and nibbles, a bread list, four small plates (all $16), four large plates (all $28), and a couple of sweets ($15).

I also order bread and a few nibbles and a bottle of nebbiolo, turning down the offer that comes more than once during the evening to try the Australian-made spirits.

The small plates come first, super quick; the bread follows; the olives never arrive.

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And we're told the wine has sold out - didn't they just open? - so I get the wine list again. It's a tidy, good list, focused on local wines, plus a reserve list. The waiter suggests a cabernet, closer to $130, which he says is similar to the nebbiolo. It's not. It's very different, from another country and costs $50 more. As I'm looking at the wine list, I miss my chance to order, because he's darted off.

I know these are opening pains and, in the focus on grooming and design, it's possible the bothersome staff training has been neglected.

When I did this as a much younger man, you didn't get near a table until you had 100 hours clocked up.

The ''small plates'', which look very much like entrees, are very good and cutting edge. We have a bowl of super-fine hand-rolled spaghettini, cloaked in good oil, seasoned with shaved cured liver, with some raw greenery, and a soft-poached egg, binding the delicate arrangement. A lesson in restraint and elegance: love it.

Likewise, a plate of asparagus with parsley root, pistou and hazelnuts is very attractive. It has a scattered, carefree look and is so simple in creation, yet works so well, the parsley root giving it an earthy grounding.

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I've collared another waiter for a bottle of Brian Freeman's very savoury valpolicella-styled corvina-rondinella blend, a stunning wine, full of continental small goods and leather, and much more like the nebbiolo I was after.

And our smallish plates are whisked away with all the cutlery. The waiter dances off with a sweet but ominous ''Hope you enjoyed your meal'', leaving us with just the bread and butter and our fingers. There is a finality to this that again makes me anxious. What if they forget us? Will polo shirts and boat shoes ever be cool again?

I have plenty of time to see people heading in and out of the Parlour party in full swing and I'm wondering whether they will let us in while we're waiting for our mains. The kitchen has pumped out a lot of meals, but the rather loud polishing of cutlery and general winding-down feeling isn't giving us confidence. Maybe the olives will come soon.

I grab the attention of a young Alex Perry. He says we're up next and, bingo, we are. The large plates arrive, but no cutlery - it's all being polished - and my flank steak with black garlic, onion crumb and smoked potato is cold.

There is some crunchy and chilled broccolini on the plate and a white sauce - is this the smoked potato? I'm trying to enjoy this and live by the well-known mantra, I don't do mainstream, but when I do, I'll be the first, but flank steak, usually supremely flavourful and interesting, isn't so when it's cold.

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They're getting a bit over all our queries and requests, which are so far from the bro-hugging around the open kitchen hub, but I need to know something. Is this the way it's meant to be?

No, it's not meant to be cold, we are assured - phew - but it is cooked sous vide, he offers, starting to explain what that means.

I feel like countering that this is old school: Margaret Fulton boiled things in bags, right? I love low-temperature cooking - I've got a circulator in my laundry next to the dehydrator and thermosiphon - but if you're going to cook like this, you still have to get it to the table warm. They offer to replace the dish, but I'm not in the mood to wait.

The other main is very good. Local trout with lots of pickles, radishes and beets, light and textured, beautifully arranged and really as good a fish dish as we've had.

Another bright spot is dessert. Roasted rhubarb, burnt butter cream and gingerbread is a terribly brilliant combination, very intense and complex, the gingerbread cake really highlighting that earthy rhubarb flavour, which is accentuated with dried rhubarb and the super-rich butter. Really good.

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Roasted peach, vanilla yoghurt, rose and pistachio brittle not only sounds good, but it delivers with a wow. I feel like hugging someone. The peach is so peachy, the dried flower and nuts are a terrific seasoning, and the dense yoghurt curd has an amazing binding ability.

So we leave with mixed feelings. I really want to come back, and have one of those seats with backs on them and a table with space to share.

A. Baker needs to focus on getting basics, such as service, right, and the steak needs rethinking. It might seem as if your grumpy uncle is in town, but if a dish isn't working, it shouldn't be there.

However, the rest of the food has been very good, tidy, modern, beautifully arranged and thoughtful, and we're not charged for the mains, so there's a recognition that all was not as it was meant to be.

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