Pilu at Freshwater

Lovely place for lunch with a view. I had the 7 course degustation and everything was amazing. You must try their crackling pork It’s one of the best I’ve had in Sydney.

Pilu is overrated. It is beautifully placed at the edge of Freshwater Beach, the atmosphere is nice; placed in a beach side house. Service in our case was good, although I see from other reviews that it can be spotty. Wine list, especially Italians, is very solid and deserves the recognition it gets from Wine Spectator and others. All this is important of course, but it’s really all about the food, right?
This is frankly a lot more hit and miss. We have been to Pilu twice: the first time as a large group and this past weekend with just another couple. My dishes seemed well conceived on the menu, but just didn’t come through in execution. Case in point, the pecorino consume was so salty you couldn’t taste the rest of the soup and finer points of the cheese itself. Sure, pecorino is a salty cheese, but this dish was not well balanced. The wagyu beef dish again was well set up, but the meat itself was so fatty (and as fat goes, beef fat is not high on my list of delicacies), it made eating it rather unpleasant. There were some highlights though — my wife’s chicken dish as good and the side of roasted pumpkin was very nice. One true standout was the chocolate dessert. A dollop of chocolate moussy icecream on top of a home made biscuit and a layer of frozen parsley. Yup — parsley. But this bitterness of the parsley with the richness of the chocolate was so unexpected and extraordinarily delicious. At least we ended on a high!

Great restaurant ambiance and delicious food. My two gripes are the lady maître de was unfriendly and, after I had informed the waiter that neither myself or my guest drank, the pre dessert was drenched in alcohol and we weren’t told this would be the case nor was it mentioned on the menu. As someone who has had alcohol issues in the past, hence the not drinking for many years, getting a mouthful of alcohol was not a good thing. Other than this couple of small issues it was a great overall experience.

The view is amazing. The food does not disappoint. We started with the stuffed Calamari and kingfish tartare. Very tasty and crisp dishes to start of the meal. We had been advised by many to have the suckling pork. It serves two at ~$ 100. Sensational. Everything you could want in a pig. Thin and crispy crackling meat was tender and falling off the bone with some nice simple condiments. The meal was very filling. The food will not leave you hungry.
So why only 3 stars? There was a hair in my food and while these things happen for $ 120+ a person i expect better. Drinks service was also very slow.
The staff were helpful, polite and courteous and knew the menu and wine selections very well.
I would recommend going; as from all the feedback i have from friends has been very positive. I would suggest lunch time or summer dinner to take full advantage of the view.

By far the best restaurant in Sydney. Giovanni came out to see if we enjoyed our dinner. Felt like we were part of an Italian family. The suckling pig just can’t be missed. Will go back again and again.

Excellent service, food is absolutely amazing.
I would highly recommend getting there early in the winter months to enjoy the view.
If you’re on a budget then this place is not for you but it’s definitely worth every cent.
The guy that gave it 2 stars should probably look into heading to McDonalds if he wants fast food. Every time I’ve been to Pilu I’ve spent a good 2 hours there because its a relaxing place. Most restaurants are trying to get you out the door so they can turn over as many customers as possible.
Get on it!

Eight course tasting menu with wine pairings, in a fabulous setting. Wow!
Our only negative was arriving too late to enjoy the views. They’re fantastic, overlooking a major northern Sydney suburb beach. (I’ve been to the building before, but not for a meal, so I’ve seen the view). But enough of what we missed.
What we didn’t miss was a Sardinia in Australia meal. The chef is one of Sydney’s tops, from the Italian island of Sardinia. The restaurant has won awards as one of Australia’s top Italian restaurants. All the food was done Sardinian style and all the wines were from Sardinia.
One issue I particularly appreciate is that the portions are large enough to enjoy, not just get a hint of. No foam, no chemistry experiments, just delicious food in great combinations of Italian seasonings.
My favorite course was the fregola with tomato and a ragu of the restaurant’s homemade salamis. Fregola is a Sardinian pasta, tiny beads of pasta like couscous. It has a stronger, nuttier flavor than couscous. The salamis ragu matched perfectly and was so fresh and flavorful. And, as I said before, there was enough on my plate to enjoy eight or ten bites.
The snapper fillet with an Italian white wine and green olives was a perfectly prepared piece of excellent Australia fish, nice and tender and flaky.
Those were my two favorites. The kingfish with pomegranate and sorrel, and the gnocchetti with spanner crab and guanciale (pig’s cheek), were both good. The plum granita and thyme crème fraîche was tasty, as was the dessert Sardinian fried pastry with ricotta, sultanas, and honey. The cheese course could have been better. And what was billed as the highlight — the suckling pig — was the only course with pathetic portions. It may have been tasty, but I couldn’t tell from what I was served. All was good, but the fregola and the snapper were absolutely outstanding.
We had excellent pairing wines, all from Sardinia. My favorite was the Santadi Araja — Valli di Porto Pino IGT.
The building is old with classy rooms, each with limited seating. That made it nice and intimate. We had great service from many different waitstaff serving different courses, which was highlighted by their expert descriptions of each course and its preparation.
Overall — an unabashed recommendation if you are a foodie.

Sorry, Pilu was #fail in every sense. Service was absolute rubbish — 15 minutes to take a drink order, 20 minutes more to take a food order. We were one of only 4 – 5 tables and had a 6:30pm booking, yet it took 1 hour and 40 minutes before our mains arrived. It was so frustrating I actually got up and walked into the kitchen to ask what the deal was. To top it off the food was mediocre at best.

Pilu at Freshwater is definitely worth a visit for a taste of Sardinia, particularly perfect on a beautiful sunny day. Our table, although it was not right next to the windows, it still gave us a view of Freshwater beach. Several tables moved outside at the end of their main meal to enjoy the cheese platter and wine. Highly recommend this if you can, to end a great afternoon at Pilu.
The service at Pilu is pretty spot on. Waiters and waitresses bringing dishes from our tasting menu accompanied with detailed explanations of the dishes minus the feeling that they were doing it for the thousandth time. I was really impressed at the friendliness of the staff. To top it off, one of the waiters turned out to be an amazing tenor and sang an acapella arietta in the middle of the restaurant, which stopped the whole restaurant in its tracks. Not something you would normally experience at a hatted restaurant.
We started with bread served with Sardinian olive oil and sea salt. Out came the Amuse Bouche (tuna tartare). It wasn’t spectacular but then again I personally don’t recall ever having an amazing Amuse Bouche.
The first course was ‘Scampi with sea urchin butter’. The scampi meat was cooked perfectly and was so sweet matching wonderfully with the sea urchin butter sauce. I could have kept going on these the whole afternoon!
The second dish was ‘Ravioli of potato, mint and pecorino with burnt butter, sage and black truffle’. The ravioli was cooked perfectly — al dente, though 2 ravioli seemed just a little on the small side (even for a dish in a tasting menu)
The third dish was my favourite and I am still having cravings for it! ‘Fregola with tomato and cured meat ragu’. The waiter explained the tiny pasta balls are made from semolina dough and rolled on terracotta. At first I would have thought that it would be quite strong in taste but it was delightfully light.
Our palate cleanser, ‘Orange & olive sorbet’ (orange sorbet with chopped black olives on the bottom) was very refreshing. It is definitely something for those (me), who are into sweet and salty at the same time.
The first main was ‘Snapper fillet with Vernaccis and green olives’. The waitress explained that this dish is a match made in heaven if you have it with the matching wine — Contini ‘Karmis’ — Bianco Tharros IGT). I am sure it would be if the fish wasn’t so salty. Unfortunately, I struggled to finish the fish as a result of this. Though the green olives did go well.
The next main was Pilu’s specialty dish. ‘Oven roasted suckling pig, served on the bone with condiments’. It was presented on a wooden board which gave it a nice rustic feel. I love roasted pig especially with the crackling so this dish to me was good. Just one thing noted and this was, the pig was slightly on the fatty side. It was served with 3 condiments — orange marmalade, apples and pesto. The orange marmalade was the stand out as it worked well with the richness of the pork.
With our mains over, the best part was to come. ‘Sardinian fried pastry filled with fresh ricotta and sultanas, served with warm corbezzolo honey! OMG! This dessert is truly sensational. I seriously think we should start and end with this dish! To finish off the tasting menu, some honey meringues and almond macaroons!
For $ 115 per person ($ 175 per person with matching wine), the food, the service and the view were definitely up there with the top hatted restaurants. I thouroughly enjoyed the dining experience and would highly recommend Pilu.

OMG. This place is the bomb. It’s like sitting inside a postcard right on Freshwater Beach. A stunning old Federation home houses the typically Sardinian fine dining restaurant — wrapped with windows with spectacular uninterrupted views across sparkling Freshy Beach. Can’t decide on wine from the exhaustive Italian menu divided by region, so our sweet Italian waiter provides us with a range of samples — all divine, so I leavel it up to my dining companion to choose. Pork is the house specialty which I’ve been dying to try. Alas, the dish is no longer available for uno, but must be shared between 2. I plead with the waiter to prepare a single serve for me and they come to the party which is appreciated because I’ve been hanging to try the pork for at least one year. Oven roasted suckling pig slow cooked for several hours — various cuts, served on the bone with traditional farm house suckling pig sausage, pinzimonio and roast potatoes — $ 95 for two. My starter is a special… drunk figs stuffed with gorgonzola and wrapped in proschuitto then roasted to caramelized perfection. The a la carte menu is fairly limited, but everything is appealing and you could easily work your way through it all. Über appealing starters include: lightly battered zucchini flower and Claire de Lune oyster, with fried squid and Crystal Bay prawns $ 26; and ravioli of potato, mint and pecorino with burnt butter, sage and black truffle $ 28. Two more tantalising reasons I have to go back… slow cooked Coronga leg of lamb with artichoke purée and crisp artichoke $ 45; and whole baby snapper oven baked with Vernaccia and green olives $ 42. Authentic as Italian gets.