Uncut Seafood Delicatessen is a flash new Bondi fishmonger from the Lucas siblings: Nic, and twins Jack and Kaitlin. Behind an unassuming glass-fronted facade sits a luxe (and very beige) space filled with Taj Mahal quartzite from Brazil and brushed brass hardware, described by the trio as the “Fendi of fish shops”. There’s an open cabinet glistening with ice, impressive whole fish and octopus from Tassie. At the counter, plump tuna steaks join salmon, snapper and barramundi. A lot of it – bar the Atlantic salmon – the siblings have picked that morning from the fish auction.

The brief? To “not look like a fish shop and not smell like a fish shop,” Nic tells Broadsheet. “We [only] fish recreationally, as if we couldn’t get enough fish in our lives. But we go to the markets every morning – not the markets most people see, but the auctions. We [study the rows of fish and] buy off the auction floor every morning, and we’ll continue to do that forever.”

Each Lucas child has their specialty: Nic’s on filleting, Jack’s on shucking and Kaitlin does front of house and menu development. But, as fourth-generation fishmongers, dealing with a fresh catch runs in their blood. Their dad owns a wholesale spot, and their grandfather had a fish’n’chipper called Chippy’s. Their great-grandfather was a fisherman in Greece. “So yeah, a fair bit of seafood passed through the family,” Nic laughs.

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But it’s not fish’n’chips on Bondi Road. It’s perfected fillets served with pita bread, family-recipe taramasalata and a serve of seasonal greens. There’s a raw tuna poke-style slaw. There are salads jazzed up with house-pickled octopus and things skewed more to a takeaway crowd. A “real big” prawn roll sees sauced-up local prawns join lettuce and avo on a focaccia, and the gravlax bagel delivers salmon cured in-house. “It’s just the stuff we’ve grown up eating,” says Nic.

The grilled side of the menu is where Uncut gets turbocharged – a lava grill is powered with volcanic rocks imported from New Zealand. “The grill is a gas ignition that heats up these lava rocks – they get super, super hot. We hang the fish up [in our cool room and] dry the skin a little bit; that way, when we put it on the grill, we’re able to char it to the point that the skin comes out super, super crispy.”

The trio’s new joint also operates as a classic fish shop – stop in from 9am for a catch to cook at home, plus your pick from a range of pantry items (like tins of Kin bluefin tuna, house-pickled octopus and local sea salt). Plus, Jack dry-shucks oysters to order.

“You’d be hard-pressed to find better cooked fish,” Nic says confidently. “It’s very good, restaurant-quality fish on a sidewalk, essentially.”

Uncut Seafood Delicatessen
135 Bondi Road, Bondi

Hours:
Mon 9am–1pm
Wed to Sun 9am–7pm

@uncutseafooddelicatessen