Bentley Restaurant & Bar

8.8 Highly Recommended

Food  9      Ambience  9      Service  9      Value  8     

Highly impressed. Great service. Great food. Patrick, our waiter is fantastic. The crowd can be a bit discouraging though.

Apr 12, 2008 

7.8 Recommended

Food  9      Ambience  8      Service  8      Value  6     

I dined here recently with a large group and was very impressed. The creative, mouth-watering menu made it difficult to choose, so we opted for a range of the tapas items to share as entrees, and each enjoyed our own mains. Each meal was unique and better than the next, and not one of us walked away empty-stomached or disappointed. Fantastic wine list and friendly service also. Will return!

Mar 08, 2008 

7 Recommended

Food  7      Ambience  8      Service  8      Value  5     

Our third visit and it will be our last. All prices have risen by about $3-$4 per dish and the wine prices also seem a littlle higher. Food portions seem to be shrinking, with both the tapas and mains not up to there usual size. So for our $160.00 we'll go elsewhere.

Feb 27, 2008 

8.8 Highly Recommended

Food  8      Ambience  9      Service  10      Value  8     

I have just returned from my 3rd visit to Bentleys and can fortunately say it was the best. I was afraid that it would become yet another flash in the pan of the Sydney gastronomic map but hopefully it will become a stalwart. I like big portions but having had the degustation menu the last two times can say it fills a 100kg man.

Previously the service has been on the rude side, enough to make me go elsewhere for a similar experience, but try and get Lorraine to serve you. She is not only extremely knowledgable about the food and wine, but when unsure asks her colleagues to assist. Thus we enjoyed a fantastic Albarino we wouldn't normally have tried, and when requesting guidance for a pinot noir were directed to Marlborough NZ and Tasmania where we usually stick to Otago.

The food was a conversation point throughout with interesting and sometimes downright fantastic flavours showing through. Being the Friday before Australia Day, the background noise was minimal which I think added to the experience. On previous occasions there have been too many casual drinkers close by which detract from the dining experience.

So in summary - service has improved (if you get Lorraine), food is still as innovative as ever, and without the stuffiness of similarly targeted customers I still reckon this one is a winner. I guess from previous reviews just make sure you are 4 or less in a party and that it's not rammed. In which case sit back and enjoy a great foody journey...

Jan 26, 2008 

8.5 Highly Recommended

Food  9      Ambience  8      Service  9      Value  8     

I came here wanting an entree main and dessert but my girlfriend (pretty miss emma) convinced me to have the tapas and I'm glad she did all the food, was lovely, very inventive flavours, great presentation and the waiters were here to please, I love a restaurant where they offer their own advice and are attentive. Will be coming back p.s wine was to die for and so is emma.

Jan 05, 2008 

7 Recommended

Food  8      Ambience  6      Service  6      Value  8     

Booked a table of ten for lunch however table would have comfortable for 7-8 people but was slightly squishy and all elbows with ten. The food was delicious having a selection of tapas for a shared entree and individual mains. With a larger table and more attentive service, the experience would have been a lot more memorable.

Dec 23, 2007 

5.5 Average

Food  5      Ambience  7      Service  5      Value  5     

Just glad I wasn't paying! I don't mind paying for a terrific dining experience but this wasn't one of them. I just thought the chief is off creating for himself and forgotten his audience because the creations were to out there and little of that I left thinking this place has missed entirely, at the end of the day this is a restaurant and it seams like the entire place has forgotten who actually pays their bills!

One point to note I felt the waiters while some might say attentive on the drinks it almost felt like they were trying to get everyone to drink as much as possible, looks good on their side at the end of the night but hardly responsible in this day and age! Definitely ain't no Ice Bergs !

Dec 06, 2007 

9 Highly Recommended

Food  10      Ambience  9      Service  8      Value  9     

This is one of my favourite bars for a drink + tapas, my favourite being the anchovy sticks! I have been here a few times and each time I find the food to be really consistent. Great little space, although a bit noisy on the weekends, mid week is best for dinner I have found. Love the menu-lots to choose from and I think it's pretty good value for the amount of effort gone into each dish-especially the desserts! They look like works of art!

Service is efficient and waiters skilled in wine knowledge, the odd smile would be well received however! It's funny reading some of the other reviews below, good to see people write honestly but sometimes they don't know what they are talking about, like the chips being covered in a weird floury coating? They are not potato chips at the Bentley, they are Chickpea chips made from chickpea flour and they Rock! Surry Hills is lucky to have the Bentley!

Oct 21, 2007 

4.8 Average

Food  5      Ambience  5      Service  5      Value  4     

Two Hats award...Come on now are you food critics kidding? Surely these guys just most know people in high places to have received this. Sydney has so much better to offer than this. Definitely the most awful dining experience I've had ever and hence the first time I've bothered to write my comments here on Eatability.

Now I don't mind spending $120 per person for a great meal and experience but this was neither. Oh yeah and we asked for the bill straight after mains and went elsewhere for coffee and dessert. The only thing that saved our evening was the company of our great friends. We had to wait at the bar with no attempt by the wait staff to bother advising us that our table was in fact available and had been since we walked in. So we had to sit on uncomfortable bar stools when we could have been seated at our table (very ordinary!)

Being lovers of great wines and based on all the SMH reviews and the fact that Nick Hildebrandt won the Good Food Guide Sommelier Award we thought worth trying. There seemed to be plenty of staff however they were far from 'warm and friendly'. They were completely arrogant and the most notable was Nick Hildebrandt himself. Despite asking if we could speak to the head Sommelier his staff either couldn't be bothered or he simply just wasn't interested. The only time we got close to Nick was as he held the door open for us at the end of the night. Oh yeah and he didn't ever bother saying goodnight.

The food and service were awful. The presentation however was interesting and creative. Much of the food tasted like they had been a bit heavy handed with Chinese "5 spice" and what is it with the side dish - chips - creative but awful, some weird floury coating on fries (Yuk!). There was definitely a clash of flavours with several of the dishes. And the famous Chicken popcorn. Now come on let's be real about it - just salted fried nothing really! Also we are absolutely certain they charged us for several additional bottles of water never presented to our table (very sneaky!).

Oct 06, 2007 

5.5 Average

Food  5      Ambience  6      Service  9      Value  2     

Pretentious food, with an implied justification for skimpy portions. For a cost of over $100 a head you'd expect to be fed not leave hungry. The tapas portions were served on toothpicks, ridiculous. Service was excellent, though a tad slow. Mains were ok but nothing to rave about, only the dessert, though still skimpy was truly a new experience for the palette.

Sep 29, 2007