Zenith on Booth, Booth Street, Annandale

Zenith on Booth, Booth Street, Annandale
Tuesday 28 March, 2006

Tonight I was catching up with an old friend who I have known for over 10 years but haven't seen for nearly 18 months. Her boyfriend is a chef and recently scored a job at Longrain - this solved our dilemma of where not to go, especially as it was his night off.

Zenith is located in the Camperdown end of Booth St. There are some great local shops here and they have a gorgeous corner location and operate the entire two floors of the building. Zenith have recently bought back the wood fired pizza with about 12 options available including the calzone. This, however is not why we decided to visit Zenith - there are far better pizzerias in Haberfield.

Tonight we sat on the upstairs terrace - it's enclosed with clear, thick plastic blinds and is quite private, especially when you are one of two tables occupied in the entire restaurant. The staff were friendly, welcoming and attentive until dessert...but I'll get to that.

I chose the spiced lamb loin pink eye roast, eggplant, king cous cous and a rosemary jus for main and my dinner buddies selected the linguine di mare al cartoccio with calarmari, mussels, vognole, yamba prawns, QLD saucer scallops wrapped in baking paper finished in a wood fired oven and the spanner crab cannelloni with baby spinach, ricotta, asparagus, tomato and basil. The meals arrived with great fanfare, especially the linguine which was presented then dramatically unwrapped at the table.

The food was surprisingly good and I think we thought we were on a roll because we readily ordered dessert. After ordering it took another 30 minutes for the desserts to arrive - trio of sorbets and icecream and the chocolate torte with grilled figs. This seemed ridiculously long and we wondered how long it would take when the restaurant was a quarter or even half full. Regardless, these desserts were disappointing and we shouldn't have bothered - the figs weren't ripe and the sorbet was in fact trio of icecream, including vanilla - why bother?

For three mains, a bottle of wine and two desserts the bill came to $55 each - that's expensive for an average meal.

Zenith on Booth - 37 Booth Street, Annandale - (02) 9660 6600

http://www.zenithonbooth.com.au/