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| The Point. |
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| Mmmmm... fresh meat. |
The Point is one of the more famous fancy steakhouses in Melbourne. A standalone building situated in the tranquil Albert Park, the restaurant is not only renowned for excellent steak but also a picturesque view of the famous lake. It was also where we celebrated Edwin's birthday this year.
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| Mimi, Edwin, Keith and me. |
Since it is a steakhouse, most of us ordered steaks except for Kaili who ordered lamb. As such, this review is going to be extremely short as compared to those where I review more than five dishes.
Avoiding the exorbitantly priced Wagyu in the menu, I quickly skipped to the grain fed section. This time, I ordered the 250g grain fed eye fillet.
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| Eye fillet. |
My first impression of the steak was better than that of most other steaks. The crust was nicely lined with char marks, not completely burnt and dried, the bone with the marrow was placed neatly on a pile of what seemed to be coleslaw, and the surface of the plate was immaculate. It looked highly professional.
However, looks are more often than not deceiving.
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| Definitely not medium rare. |
Cutting the steak open with the knife took more effort than usual. The resistance that the meat put up was not typical of medium rare steaks. As I pried open the cut, I was rather appalled. The meat was almost completely browned. It was more cooked than a medium well steak.
I called the waiter to the table and told him I ordered a medium rare. He looked at it and said, "that is definitely not medium rare," and left with the plate.
For the next ten minutes, I had to watch everyone else enjoy their meal while I had an empty spot in front of me on the table. Fortunately Kaili fed me some of her lamb.
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| Murraylands grain fed spring lamb, charred baby leeks and vincotto dressing. |
The lamb dish was absolutely beautiful.
The lamb cutlets were served pink and the other cuts were cooked to perfection. It is rather rare (pun intended) that lamb is served this pink but that was the reason why Kaili and I loved the cutlets so much. The meat was succulent and moist from being drenched in a generous serve of the dressing. Upon an effortless bite, the meat is easily compressed and the dressing and juices flow from within onto the tongue. The pairing of pink spring lamb with the thick, intense sauce was just perfect.
The thin cut of meat and fat was a new experience for me and Kaili. We have never seen that cut of lamb before. The meat, being so close to the fat, was soft and supple. It goes without saying that the fat itself is capable of melt-in-your-mouth action. The hair-thin layer of skin had a jelly-like texture and completely absorbed the flavours of the dressing. The savoury dressing accompanies this cut well, rendering the fat less nauseating than it would have been without the sauce.
Another part of the lamb served was the lamb shank. Slow-cooked to perfection, the meat just disintegrates in the mouth. Fully infused with the vincotto dressing, the meat was packed with strong flavours. My only problem with the lamb shank is that there was not enough of it.
The part that is kept hidden from view in the photo was what seemed to me like lamb kidneys. To me it was perfectly cooked, and there is not much more to it as kidneys just taste like kidneys. Kaili, on the other hand, is not a fan of entrails, and left almost all of them to me.
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| Eye fillet take two. |
After ten minutes, the waitress who took my order came back with a plate of steak. She apologised for the blunder with the first steak and told me the chef gave complimentary cuts of their best meat, the Blackmore Wagyu.
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| Something like medium rare. |
This time, the chef got the steak almost to the right rarity. Still, it was a bit dry from the crust to about half an inch into the steak.
There was really nothing spectacular about the steak. It was just a typical eye fillet one can get from any of the more famous steakhouses in Melbourne. The steak was tender and juicy in the middle and was adequately seasoned. It was good enough to eat on its own as the beef was naturally flavourful.
All the beef dishes are accompanied by peppered fig chutney, black garlic butter and house mustard. My favourite among those would be the peppered fig chutney. Sweet and spicy with a texture similar to sundried tomatoes soaked in oil, it embellished the savoury beef well by giving it a sweet and tangy flavour. The black garlic butter tasted like regular garlic bread butter and was nothing to shout about. The house mustard, on the other hand, was something to shout about, not in a good way. It tasted exactly like wasabi and totally robbed the beef of its natural flavours.
I have also sampled a few of the sauces. The red wine sauce which I ordered was rather subtle as to not mask the beef's flavour. It had a toned down sweetness which made it pale in comparison to the peppered fig chutney. The bearnaise sauce was too dilute for me, which made me question the point of having the beef with the sauce since it hardly did anything to the flavour. The piece de resistance would have to be the mushroom sauce. Thick and dark with an ostentatious display of complex flavours from different mushrooms, most prominent of which shitake, the sauce is probably one of the best mushroom sauces that has graced my tongue.
The bone marrow was nothing special. I suppose it is eaten more for texture than taste. It was quite rare and was still pink. It was akin to eating jelly, just a lot bloodier.
Last but not least, the Blackmore Wagyu slices. They were so precious that I was only given four pieces by the chef, one of which I gave Edwin as a birthday present, another I fed Kaili with. I would have to say that the Wagyu slices made me a little exasperated and consolidated my disappointment in the restaurant. They were by far over-seasoned. It made me wonder whether the meat was aged by salting. It was a blatant insult to Blackmore Wagyu. Texture-wise the beef was perfect. Thoroughly marbled, tender, succulent, but just too damned salty. That, to me was the deal breaker.
Perhaps it would not be fair to judge after eating once at a restaurant, but more often than not, a restaurant has only one chance to impress. Being a renowned steakhouse, The Point has managed to kill off whatever expectation I had for it prior to dining there by serving salted Wagyu. Will I return to The Point? Probably not when I have places like Bob's.
Aquatic Dr,
Albert Park Lake,
Melbourne 3206,
VIC.
0396825566
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