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Awards
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2009 |
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SMH Good Food Guide 2009 - One Chef's Hat |
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Overview
Civic Dining, located on the first floor of the Civic Hotel, corner of Pitt & Goulburn streets, offers all the flavours of the Mediterranean.
Head chef Peter Conistis offers Greek-influenced Australian cuisine. The welcoming staff will assist diners with selecting their dishes and matching wines. The Civic Hotel is known as a magnificent display of deco architecture dating back to the 1940s. The restaurant is also complete with stunning and stylish surroundings.
The "Modern Mediterranean'' dishes are adaptations of or heavily influenced by traditional Greek dishes. Through many years of research and numerous trips to Greece, Peter has been able to hone his unique style. He has had lengthy conversations with mothers and grandmothers in villages throughout Greece, providing him with a greater appreciation and understanding of the regional food.
Peter's dishes include both local and international produce and are reliant on seasonal produce. His most popular dishes include: Moussaka of eggplant, seared sea scallops and taramosalata; Blue swimmer crab and haloumi tartlet with witlof, cucumber and Avruga caviar and many more.
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See Also
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Related Editorial Content
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User Reviews on Civic Dining
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 11 comments
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| Overall |
  
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Average |
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Food 6 |
Ambience 6 |
Service 6 |
Value 5 |
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As a regular diner enjoying variety of food on offer in Sydney, I still fail to understand how the good food guide ratings worked, what is so special about this restaurant deserving a hat. I love innovative greek/mediterrenean/turkish food, but my experience in this restaurant was nothing more than average.
Quail entree was undercooked and not seasonal well. Beef cheek was on the contrary a bit overcooked and dry but the jus was very nice. Highlight of the evening was the desserts though, I really loved the deconstructed chocolate baklava, it was a proof of a very talented chef, I maybe choose the wrong dishes on the night.
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trufflenomore -
See my reviews 34 , 02 December 2008
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| Overall |
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Recommended |
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Food 8 |
Ambience 7 |
Service 8 |
Value 8 |
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I dined at the civic a few weeks back and had a marvelous time. The food was well thought out and tasty and had great service. My partner and I shared the quail with watermelon, feta and chorizo (which we both agreed was great) and the scallop moussaka (which was recommended by friends) the moussaka was a very modern version with discs of eggplant, layed with scallops and sweet capsicum.
Definitely a stand out. Mains also very good, we had the Beef and the snapper.
There were only 2-3 waiters in a nearly full restaurant but as they zipped around we never had to wait for anything, wine/water constantly topped up and good advice given on wine and food. For the two of us dining the bill was around $200 which I thought was very reasonable in a good city restaurant. I hope to return soon.
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neo -
See my reviews 1, 14 November 2008
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0 of 2 people found the following review helpful
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| Overall |
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Average |
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Food 5 |
Ambience 6 |
Service 5 |
Value 4 |
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One sentence sums up the food at Civic Dining, some good ideas but not very well executed. Quail for entree was not cooked enough and some of the meat near the bone was reddish. Mix of flavours was interesting however. Main of Kingfish, very odd plate. Olive crusted fish was too dry in some places, nice in others so not cooked evenly.
Then there was a pastry filled with anchovy paste, and an orange and fennel salad. These three items were placed separately on the plate with nothing linking them together. The fish and pastry were too strong together due to the combination of anchovies and olives (and I love both these ingredients), where they should have balanced each other out.
No sauce whatsoever on the plate so the logical thing would have been to balance the two mentioned items with the third item of orange and fennel salad, but, unfortunately, this also was put in one corner of the plate and it's tiny serving meant it was finished before I could even get halfway through either the fish or pastry. To pay $36 for this, definitely isn't worth it.
The Chicken main also had its flaws. Chicken meat had no flavour at all, and instead of putting more of the yoghurt sauce to compensate, this again was in a tiny serving.
A nice dessert of rice pudding finished off the meal but overall quite disappointed and definitely too expensive for what it is. We won't be returning and I suggest the SMH good food guide should be more critical in its reviews in future as this is definitely not a one hat or 15/20 restaurant.
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angnando -
See my reviews 1, 09 November 2008
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| Overall |
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Recommended |
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Food 7 |
Ambience 6 |
Service 7 |
Value 7 |
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Perhaps, I had high expectations of this place being a hatted restaurant, food was good but it didn’t have a wow factor for me. We tried the quail as an entrée and beef cheek, it was ‘just’ good.
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Raynora -
See my reviews 9, 08 October 2008
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| Overall |
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Average |
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Food 5 |
Ambience 5 |
Service 7 |
Value 5 |
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The service was good, a bit odd at times. The food is pricey for what it is, two of us had the snapper and it was pretty bland. The lamb was good, but a very small serve and agree with another review, it is pricey to get any vegetables or sides, after all it is a walk through a pub downstairs to get to it. Tried it once, don't think I would go back.
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GILJEN07 -
See my reviews 12, 17 September 2008
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| Overall |
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Recommended |
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Food 7 |
Ambience 8 |
Service 6 |
Value 7 |
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Had a main here the other night. My mate and I didn't want to eat pub food and so we decided to check Civic Dining out. We were greeted at the bar with a smile. I don't mind going to the bar for service and the like, but I would've preferred being greeted by floor staff. The service was friendly and efficient but the floor staff were overstretched. I think there were 2 people working the floor and the place was almost full.
I've always liked the Civic. Great decor, great design. I am glad that they didn't lose any of this when they kitted out Civic Dining. In fact, I think they made it better, because the bistro that was there before felt like an old uni bar.
I only had a main, a side and some wine so my score on the food might have to get adjusted when I come again. I had the lamb shoulder. Very nice, braised to perfection and served on a polenta bread. The sauce could be a bit thicker and should've packed some more punch. It was served with another piece of lamb wrapped in a vine leaf. This was overcooked. We had the chips as a side. Nothing great but the parmesan and oregano did lift it somewhat. Wine list is good, having a good variety and catering for most budgets.
I love the Civic and the food was pretty good. I do want to try the other goodies on the menu.
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Sillybugger -
See my reviews 24, 15 September 2008
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| Overall |
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Average |
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Food 4 |
Ambience 6 |
Service 9 |
Value 7 |
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I thought the food was good, The service was great and I had a great time. The terrace is a nice place to have a pre-dinner drink. I will be back.
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Response from Management:
A mezze menu is now available on the Terrace from 6pm Tuesday till Saturday.
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eater001 -
See my reviews 1, 22 July 2008
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| Overall |
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Recommended |
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Food 7 |
Ambience 8 |
Service 10 |
Value 8 |
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I ate here for dinner the other night. What can I say it was beautiful. I had the blue swimmer crab tart - so delicate. For my main I had the beef which was a little rich but enjoyable. Was too full for dessert but everything looked really good.
I thought the wine list was great, I loved the bottle of red recommended to me (can't remember what it was) but the real highlight of our evening was the service. Our waiter was really fantastic making us all feel at home and his knowledge and obvious passion for his job was really lovely. I don't agree with the last review - the front of house team here is really on the money, good job.
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superfoodie03 -
See my reviews 1, 21 July 2008
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| Overall |
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Recommended |
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Food 10 |
Ambience 6 |
Service 1 |
Value 6 |
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Ate here on Thursday lunch, the food was out of this world. But come to the service I have a few points: The waiter was friendly yet rude, the floor staff was very frank as if I had nothing to do in the sorts of wine. In short the food was fantastic but the front of house needs a complete makeover.
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pakard -
See my reviews 1, 05 July 2008
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0 of 1 people found the following review helpful
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| Overall |
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Below Average |
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Food 6 |
Ambience 3 |
Service 7 |
Value 1 |
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Bad lighting, uncomfortable chairs, boring food and too expensive. Just imagine paying $36 for a rabbit pie with no veges or chips on the plate. Waiters friendly but it feels like ship’em in and ship’em out atmosphere. Sorry I won’t be back..
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Ems -
See my reviews 14, 07 May 2008
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