Manly Pavilion

15/20

Before me lies a mass of bright-blue water, criss-crossed with sleek yachts and ferries, edged with timbered cliffs. Around me, people sit on Italian designer furniture on an Italian marble terrazzo balcony eating grilled scampi and sipping chilled Greco di Tufo. It's so breathtakingly beautiful I could be in Portofino, Ravello, Amalfi.

Which is exactly what the owner of Manly Pavilion, David Gray, and architects Squillace and Nicholas want me to think. Gray openly admits the dining experience has been inspired by the glamour of Italy's Amalfi Coast.

But all this talk of Amalfi is annoying. This is Manly, Sydney, Australia. The trees are eucalypts, the yachts are maxis, the ferry is called Narrabeen and the gorgeous wedding-cake building was built in 1930 as a bathers' pavilion. Yes, it's beautiful but not because it reminds me of somewhere I can't afford to go – it's beautiful because it's ours and because it's right here.

In truth, the louvred windows, bare tables and airy, whitewashed, split-level space are reminiscent of that pioneering Australian restaurant, Berowra Waters Inn, opened by Tony and Gay Bilson in 1977. Yes, the menu is mainly Italian but it's Italian that has been fashioned by local produce, created by a young Australian chef with Mediterranean heritage who has worked with our own Stefano Manfredi and Janni Kyritsis. It's more "Manly Italian" than "mainly Italian".

Chef Jonathan Barthelmess has a light, gentle hand with seafood; something immediately clear with a starter of two nude scampi that feel warmed through rather than cooked, resting on a crisp and clever celery "ragu", with a little seaweed dust and a deconstructed "bagna cauda", the anchovy, garlic and oil elements reduced to a drizzle ($28). It's expensive but then scampi retails at David Jones for $8 each. Next, a strangely comforting combination of raw, sliced veal with cured and dehydrated egg yolk and parmesan ($24) totally surprises with its earthy yet clean tastes.

One thing that really places this restaurant in a modern, progressive country is the wine list, in which antipodean offerings sit easily in the context of French and Italian. It has spirit, wit, opinion and insider intelligence. Young-gun sommelier Michael Watt follows his heart with a real commitment to "natural" wines, those with minimal intervention by the maker. A Lucy Margaux Monomeith Pinot Noir ($88) from Adelaide Hills natural-wine producer Anton van Klopper is an unfined, unfiltered joy, all clarity and suppleness.

It goes to town on rich, juicy beef short rib ($38), slow-braised for 12 hours, grilled, scattered with black olive and cress then overlaid with a giant halved marrow bone. The flavour is big but the striated meat is so tender you can press your finger right through the crusty top to the plate, although I'm not sure why you'd want to.

Less macho is a lovely fillet of grilled jewfish ($38) served with a froth-and-bubble sauce of lemon-powered avgolemono, scattered with punchy little red amaranth leaves. Pea and ricotta gnocchi with nettle butter and crab ($28) is sweet to the taste but doesn't quite gel as a dish and a green-leaf salad is beautifully dressed but feels mean for $12.

One whinge is that it's difficult to tell how big or small the dishes will be – you might need that good bread and peppery Cutrera olive oil to be getting on with, or parlay the meal into a five-course tasting menu for $88 a person.

Somebody's having fun with the petits fours, however. Lemonade gummy bears, chocolate hazelnuts and crisp almond cats' tongues will hopefully put chocolate truffles out of business forever.

The crowd, settled into the beachside bar, terrace and more comfortable interior, has perfected that artless dressing style that looks casual but comes with its own yacht. I find the opening prices steep but already Manly Pav is on my shortlist for best new restaurant of 2010.

The wait staff are well trained, the owner cares enough to be on the floor and it all feels good, from the smallest detail to the larger view. This is exhilarating food of great lightness and freshness from a sensitive chef who instinctively knows how to balance a dish with a little pickle, soft herb or fragrant oil.

The sheer beauty of the setting gives me hope that one day our restaurateurs will stop wishing they were somewhere else and build more restaurants in our own vernacular, making them uniquely ours. Then everyone else in the world will wish they were here instead.

tdurack@smh.com.au