Chef Jeff Schroeter snaps up former Darling Mills site on Glebe Point Road

The inner west site where turn-of-the-century dining temple Darling Mills collected an enviable number of SMH Good Food Guide hats is headed for a culinary reboot, with former Bistro Moncur and Bayswater Brasserie chef Jeff Schroeter snapping up the Glebe site.

It has an opening date (late February) but no official name as the owner-chef is still in the process of registering one. What it will have, Schroeter tells Good Food, is a menu with his vanilla lobster on it.

After Darling Mills – an early pioneer of restaurants using produce from their own farms – departed the historic Glebe Point Road building, an Indian restaurant took up residence. Schroeter explains it was empty before he was approached to take it.

"There are some closed shops on the street, but there are a lot of people within five kilometres. The building has good bones, we're giving the old girl some new polish. I call it casual luxury," he says.

Schroeter has an interesting CV, having worked at some seminal Sydney restaurants, as well as a brief spell as the on-air chef for Sexy Cuisine TV, a program shot in the South of France.

In 2014, the chef told Good Food he put the scantily clad extras to task. "I had them all working, taking corn off the cob and jobs like that."

He wants the new Glebe venue to be flexible: somewhere you can drop in for an hour for a quick bite or a long, lingering meal.