Review: Grand Duk cafe, something a bit different in the CBD

Amanda Hooton

June 4, 2016

This CBD spot is an oasis during a busy lunch hour.Cole Bennetts

Tucked at the rear of Grosvenor Place in the city, Grand Duk is a surprising find during a busy lunch hour: an oasis of calm in the dusty, dirty city (even dustier and dirtier at the moment, thanks to the works on George Street). It's set half-indoors, half-outdoors against the back wall of the building's forecourt, and its stylish round tables and green upholstered chairs welcome everyone, whether they're concerned with closing the deal by Friday, like the businessmen at the next table, or Jon Snow's resurrection in Game of Thrones, like we are at ours.

The menu is the exact opposite of calm: lots of slightly oddball breakfast and lunch options (muesli trifle, five spice tofu burger, heirloom tomato and som tum), plus banh mi, rice rolls and an extensive wine list plus cocktails like Pink Fizz and Rose of Hanoi. A glass of prosecco feels staid by comparison, but our beautiful Irish waitress make us feel like thrillseekers rather than midweek worker ants. "Bubbles at lunch on a school day!" she exclaims in her lilting voice. That's us, we suddenly think – crazy gourmets on the loose.

Throwing caution to the wind, we order like Cersei Lannister – entirely to please our own appetites. This yields us (as it does her), some pretty wild combinations: duck fat potato chips and sticky master stock pork belly, Viet fried chicken san choy bow, and avocado and lime smash. The Irish waitress doesn't turn a hair. "A lady ordered the smash with the duck chips yesterday," she says. "It looked delicious."

Coconut yoghurt chia pot with banana chips and fresh berries.Cole Bennetts

It is delicious: the duck chips crunchy and rough-edged, the avocado luscious and creamy, with a little kick of tartness. "The only sad thing is the boobs," says my friend, still deep in GOT-recap mode, digging into the pork belly (slightly too firm and fatty for my taste). The businessmen give a collective start. "Not a single boob since the series began," my friend laments. "How's the san choy bow?"

Slightly odd, to be honest: the fried chicken is in inch-long pieces rather than minced. It is moist and flavoursome, but the accompanying lettuce is a soft, loose-leaf variety instead of robust old iceberg, which makes it hard to form a bundle. Along with pickled radish and a piquant sauce, it's like eating several tasty ingredients instead of a meal. The rice rolls, however, are light and fresh, laced with slivers of smoky duck and sweet prawn.

Buoyed by the prosecco, we order dessert – coconut crumble deep-fried ice-cream with salted caramel – and quasi dessert from the breakfast menu – coconut yoghurt chia pot with banana chips and fresh berries. The latter is deliciously light, with tangy blueberry highlights, but the coconut crumble would not be out of place as road surfacing material for the workmen nearby: dense, lumpy and fried into hard, gravel-sized bits. Still, it has the benefit of entirely protecting the ice-cream inside, which is flecked with vanilla seeds, and as cold and firm as the wall beyond Castle Black. Long live Irish waitresses, bubbles for lunch and Jon Snow.