Bombini

I'm trying to remember the last time I dined out with a live soundtrack of croaking frogs but nothing comes to me. It's a pleasant reminder we're on holiday.

Bombini landed late last year in the spot that used to be Rojo Rocket, the exuberant Mexican restaurant at Avoca, just north of Sydney. Chef Cameron Cansdell and front of house Hayley Hardcastle have worked nearby at Killcare for many years at Stefano at Bells, overseen by Stefano Manfredi. 

Now the married couple have a buzzy place of their own. Bombini is Italian for bumble bee. Where Rojo Rocket was a rollicking, hyper-coloured house of fun, Bombini is a very different kettle of fish. The lurid greens and reds have faded to more subtle tones - white and tan with splashes of yellow - and distinctive, hand-blown glass lights hang inside. The look is casual but classy.

The restaurant is in a lovely old weatherboard house with glass-louvred windows surrounded by lush gardens (hence the frog rock). Palm trees with whitewashed trunks arch above a row of outdoor day beds for relaxed reclining, and the bar on the upper terrace is covered but open to the fresh air, adding to the tropical feel. 

We head there to wait for our dinner table, having neglected to book in our holiday torpor. The personable barman delivers our order of drinks and salt cod polpettine pronto. A suave, refreshing cucumber spritzer - gin, cucumber, prosecco, St Germain elderflower liqueur - threatens to replace a well-made G&T as my favourite summer drink. Our appetites are whipped up by the crunchy-salty-creamy croquettes dipped in mayonnaise.

We are shown to an outdoor table on the verandah and the evening continues with simple but splendid food and warm, prompt service that make eating out all pleasure, no formalities.

Cured ocean trout in prosecco with summer herbs and salmon roe is a sight to behold, orange-pink against the delicate, decorative green fronds. We eat it with the good crusty bread Cansdell bakes here, dipping it in rich, fruity Frantoi Cutrera olive oil (we can buy a bottle to take home, the waitress tells us).

The entrees (primi) sound so good, we order them for main course, with an ulterior motive of fitting in dessert. This doesn't quite work as planned, as the servings are huge, larger than the usual main in Sydney, however all is not lost as we take home what we can't eat.

Veal, duck rosemary and porcini mushroom ragu over cornetti pasta comes under a snowy pile of Grana Padano cheese, a classic of deep, meaty flavours.

Seafood risotto with Aquerello rice from Piedmont has the proper, soupy consistency, the rice just bitey-right and loads of perfectly done seafood - fish, mussels, prawns, meltingly tender calamari - in every lemony mouthful, with not a trace of heaviness.

The light-as-a-feather star of the night, however, is Bombini's raspberries and cream, a class act of soft, sweet and tart: raspberry sorbet, fresh raspberries, pillowy poached meringue, marscapone cream and Champagne jelly. It's a high note to finish on.

We leave with our wrapped leftovers as the frogs ribbet on. We didn't need another good reason to head to the Central Coast, but now we've got one.

THE LOW-DOWN
THE PICKS Cucumber spritzer, seafood risotto, raspberries and cream
THE LOOK Breezy, beachy sophistication
THE SERVICE Friendly, professional