A walk down culinary lane at Beau Bar in Surry Hills

There's something very inviting about a laneway. Passages and corridors do more than link streets and channel light and air between tall buildings; they re-make the city on a more human scale.

And the best laneways are, of course, lined with little tables topped with glasses of wine and plates of food. It should be mandatory.

This is by way of a welcome to Fracks Lane, which now runs from Reservoir Street through to Foster Street in Surry Hills. It also now runs from the casual Beau & Dough manoush eatery on Reservoir to the darkly elegant Beau Bar. (Just to confuse, Beau & Dough becomes Beau Kitchen at night, offering the Beau Bar menu. Got that?)

Al and Rebecca Yazbek have tripled their Surry Hills footprint with this commitment to the area, and the laneway, not uncoincidentally, leads straight up the Foster Street hill to their Nomad flagship. Nomad exec chef Jacqui Challinor oversees the kitchen after the early departure of Stanbuli founder Ibrahim Kasif. I know, it's a little confusing.

Rebecca Yazbek and Smart Design Studio have built a moody, shadowy space around a swish black granite island bar backed by a temperature-controlled wine wall.  Tan leather banquette seating runs along the window, overlooking the small tables that line the laneway, and there's a lovely elliptical marble table at the end for a group.

It feels like a proper wine bar, and the wine offering from wine director Ged Bellis is impressive, with sought-after labels from around the globe. The on-tap wines are NSW-only, including a very drinkable gamay from Tumbarumba's Nick Spencer, poured first into a glass pichet, then into fabulous Spiegelau wine glasses at the table.

The menu feels like a work in progress, and I find it difficult to put in a coherent order. There are snacky things as you would expect, but the specialty is premium seafood on ice, including three different rock oysters, Oscietra caviar, Yarra Valley salmon roe and southern rock lobster with Marie Rose sauce and nori salsa verde.

The chef's market selection ($65 a head) comes with shellfish embedded in a large igloo of crushed ice. For two ($130), there are two rock oysters topped with an icy pink peppercorn granita, two lightly cooked and split yabbies, two tiles of yellowfin tuna sashimi, two Skull Island prawns, and two lightly pickled Spring Bay blue mussels, with two sauces for dipping. The ice tends to dull the flavours, but it's celebratory, nevertheless.

A plate of hand-sliced jamon Iberico ($45) hits the spot, teamed with sharply pickled green tomatoes. Most smaller dishes come with a value-added nut cream, dip or sauce – Pioik ciabatta with an almond cream ($6 a head); and fries, should you require them, with anchovy taramasalata ($16).

Challinor's battered and deep-fried "blooming" oyster mushrooms ($26) deliver by being delicately creamy inside and crunchy outside, seemingly growing out of a base of macadamia cream and dark green kombu oil.

Bigger dishes include a good-looking slow-roasted lamb neck with XO sauce and labne ($50), and a smartly cooked, crisp-skinned fillet of coral trout ($65). It sits in a gorgeous lobster beurre blanc that tricks you into thinking the coral trout is actually lobster.

A yoghurt sorbet and fig leaf granita ($24) is somewhat icy, and a smooth, dense roll of Valrhona chocolate ($24) references Spain with its olive oil and sea salt garnish.

By day, Beau & Dough is good for zaatar-heavy Turkish breads and chopped salads; the bright and breezy room turning into more dining space for the wine bar at night.

After a bumpy start, Beau bar seems to be settling in to its own skin, bringing all the good feels of being tucked away down a secret passage with indoor/outdoor seating, interesting wines, good lighting and elegant glassware.

The premium seafood route might, I suspect, become an issue – it's expensive, labour-intensive and difficult to pull off. What Beau already pulls off is just being a rather beautiful laneway wine bar. Which is probably enough.

The low-down

Beau Bar

Drinks Curated cocktails with a twist (Garibaldi Gazoz), 300 new and old-world wines, 25 by the glass, and fun NSW wines on tap

Vibe Moody laneway wine bar

Go-to dish Coral trout, cavolo nero, lobster beurre blanc, $65