Ethos Eat and Drink - creativity and symmetry

http://ethoseatdrink.com/

Google Maps is a lifesaver.  A bit melodramatic?  Maybe, but it's certainly pretty handy when you are in an unfamiliar city, it's dark and you are running a little bit late for a reservation at a restaurant and you have no idea where you are going.  I've always been terrible at directions and forget about the ability to read a map, I am hopeless.  I recently found myself in Hobart with an early dinner reservation and unusually for me I was running a bit late.  I had a booking for Ethos Eat and Drink and it was in a part of town that I had never been to and it was dark and I have to say that the street signs are infuriatingly missing in Hobart.  Anyway, thanks Google Maps, you got me there on time.

When I was looking around on the 'interweb' for a restaurant for dinner, there were a number of restaurants that excited me, many of which were recommended over twitter (thanks again Lani). Unfortunately my choices were restricted somewhat by the limited opening hours of restaurants in Hobart, they seem to be a Wednesday to Sunday affair in the capital of Tasmania.  Nevermind, I still had a few great options to choose from and I was particularly captivated by the approach to the menu at Ethos Eat and Drink, so it became an easy choice.

Smolt - My Hobart Experience

http://www.smolt.com.au/

Hobart is just about as far away as you can get from Brisbane, excluding Perth of course, and I recently had cause to visit the capital city of the 'Apple Isle' for a whirlwind 24 hour period.  There are not a lot of direct flights to Hobart from Brisbane, but I was lucky enough to score a direct flight that would leave me with enough time to grab a late lunch.  So the question any reasonable foodie will ask in a situation like this is 'where do I go for lunch?'  

There are quite a few lovely looking restaurants in Hobart, but there is not a big blogger scene in the city, so I didn't have as many points of reference to do some research.  Of course I did a little bit of a poll on Twitter and had a few good suggestions (thanks Lani) but most of the great restaurants in Hobart are closed on Mondays and Tuesdays.  Not being able to chose the day of my visit, it was a Tuesday and I had to deal with the hand dealt to me.  While I was somewhat limited, there were still some great options available to me and I had to decide on one.

There is a really cool area on the harbour at Hobart called Salamanca Place, which is well known for its Markets and shops, so I thought that this would be a great place to start looking.  Salamanca Place consists of rows of old sandstone buildings that were formerly warehouses for the port of Hobart Town, now converted to restaurants, galleries and 'ye olde worlde' shops.  I have to say its really cool looking and there is nothing in Brisbane that really compares, in fact it really reminded me of the Rocks in Sydney.