Little Bistro

Although Alastair Little has been credited with creating what we know as contemporary British cuisine, he’s often called “the most important chef you’ve never heard of”.

But now Sydneysiders can get to know him better, at Little Bistro.

The restaurant is a pop-up collaboration with hospitality group Merivale (it’s scheduled to run until around the end of 2018) in the restaurant space on level one of Hotel CBD, previously Bistrode.

Little stepped away from his two eponymous London fine-dining restaurants in the early 2000s. Since then he’s been preparing pate, salads and focaccias at Tavola, a high-end delicatessen in Notting Hill, London, and consulting at a seaside hotel in Britain’s Dorset. Now he’s left that all behind and relocated to Sydney.

The seasonal minestrone uses porcini, borlotti beans and seven or eight vegetables. There’s also duck with an apple-and-rosemary-filled Yorkshire pudding, pepata (peppered and steamed) mussels, and Little’s take on a bistro classic: steak. It’s rump with parmentier potatoes (cubed, fried or cooked in butter, herbs and garlic). Also expect Sydney rock oysters with bits of spicy sausage.

Little bistro does not yet have a confirmed closing date but is scheduled to run until around the end of 2018