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The other day, sommelier Nick Hildebrandt and chef Brent Savage decided to count every Good Food Guide hat they’ve been awarded over the 20 years they’ve been friends and business partners. It’s 99. The pair have won a swath of Good Food Guide Awards, and have opened more restaurants than they’ve closed.
Currently, the Bentley Group includes Mediterranean restaurant Watermans (two hats); pan-Asian King Clarence (two hats); flashy grillhouse 11 Barrack (two hats), and the fine-dining restaurant that started it all, Bentley Restaurant and Bar (two hats). At the time of writing this story, they were on the precipice of opening Southeast Asian restaurant Ashe, and late night bar Vespertine.
The secret to their success? Sandwiches. Thousands of them.
“Over the last 20 years, Brent and Ihave had lunch together pretty much every day of our life,” says Nick Hildebrandt. It’s during this time that they’ll discuss all the realities of operating a long-standing hospitality business in a city as cut-throat and fickle as Sydney. “We’ve probably had about 4000 sandwiches together. It’s a real ritual.”
Despite the lengthy rap sheet of venues and accolades, the pair are quiet achievers, preferring to be in their venues rather than in the limelight. “The Bentley Group is just me and Brent,” says Hildebrandt. “We’re not backed by anybody. We’ve pretty much always rolled the profit of our business back into the business. We don’t live in mansions. We don’t drive fancy cars.”
How does Hildebrandt safely transport the wine? “Oh, it’s not safe. It’s never safe,” he says. Dion Georgopoulos
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1 / 5Carrying precious cargo.Dion Georgopoulos
2 / 5Wines being transported.Dion Georgopoulos
3 / 5The weather putting a dampener on the fun.Dion Georgopoulos
5 / 5A man on a mission. The award-winning sommelier’s PB for transporting wine is three minutes.Dion Georgopoulos
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In fact, these days, Nick Hildebrandt spends a lot of time on Lime bikes, shifting wine from one city venue to another. He can probably get a bottle of grand cru Burgundy to a restaurant table on a bicycle faster than most Uber Eats drivers can deliver a pad see ew to a person’s lounge. “My PB,” says the award-winning sommelier, “is three minutes.”
The most expensive he ever transported via e-bike was a $5000 bottle of Montrachet. “I rode it from Watermans to Eleven Barrack,” says Hildebrandt. “I just chucked it in the basket, fanged it and we served it. And the customer really appreciated it.”
How does he safely transport the wine? “Oh, it’s not safe. It’s never safe. Sometimes it’s in a backpack. Sometimes we just carry it in our hands and sometimes we just chuck it in the basket of a Lime bike. Don’t tell Brent.”
Today, the Bentley Group employs around 200 people. Back in 2006, it was just one restaurant, Bentley, a little corner venue on Crown and Albion Street in Surry Hills. There was a lot of energy between those particleboard walls – a wild wine party with a futurist menu, trading extremely late.
Sydney hadn’t seen anything like it, and it may never again. There was something so electrifying about a place that could, in a single swing, serve a dish of seared scallops, house-made sheep’s curd and a spicy cured pork liver with a glass of Burgundy, next to a round of Alhambra beers and crunchy popcorn chicken. It was possibly the most democratic, fun and ridiculous restaurant and bar I’ve ever known. I really miss it.
A young Brent Savage and Nick Hildebrandt as they prepared to open Bentley in Surry Hills. Archive
Dishes weren’t just layered with flavour the way they are today, they were layered with many complex techniques (like spherification and espuma). There wouldn’t be enough hours in the day or staff on hand to make them now – a point Savage acknowledges. “The dishes had so many components your brain would explode,” he says.
The restaurant, in its current location on O’Connell Street in the CBD, is celebrating its final service on August 29. The reason? Nothing specific – it’s just time, they say.
But before they say auf wiedersehen, they’re featuring a bar menu of early hits – gazpacho three ways, chickpea chips with confit garlic custard, smoked eel parfait – and a restaurant tasting menu including a series of incredibly intricate desserts. “The kitchen,” says Savage, “was petrified.”
The intricate desserts from Bentley’s greatest hits menu - desserts that wouldn’t be on the menu if they created it today. Dion Georgopoulos
My original idea for this story, with all its moving parts, is to cycle and snack between their venues, but sadly, the weather has other ideas. I still get my moveable feast, though. We meet in Barangaroo at Watermans, inspired by the flavours and colours of Greece, Cyprus, Turkey and Lebanon. “I think our story has been in motion for a long time,” says Savage, over taramasalata on spongy Easter bread and a crisp little brick pastry tube filled with whipped feta and garnished with a caper leaf and citrus vinegar.
I really want to know what the pinch points are in their relationship, but Savage tells me they don’t go out of their way to push each other’s buttons. “It’s like any relationship,” he says. “The way that I think about it is it’s like having another marriage. There’s a lot of compromise.”
At Watermans in Barangaroo.Dion Georgopoulos
The very popular fish finger bao at King Clarence. Dion Georgopoulos
At King Clarence – an open-plan corner space built for fun, led by executive chef Khanh Nguyen – we pause for a Chinese-style steamed bun stuffed with crunchy-fried barramundi, American cheese, pickled chilli and salmon roe. In the early Bentley days, Savage, an old-school fine-dining chef, had a rule that every dish must evolve. Dishes that lingered for too long on a menu used to represent chef laziness for him. But lately, he’s been thinking less about his chef ego and more about what the customer might enjoy. Such as a delicious fish finger bao. They’ve sold 110,000 of them since opening in 2023.
At big, buxom grill 11 Barrack, the Good Food Guide Awards’ current Best New Restaurant, they’re all about the white tablecloth classics. We sit down to a Murray cod Wellington: tuna mousse set inside a fillet of Murray cod, wrapped in finely chopped mushroom, swaddled in pastry and baked until golden. Sliced and served tableside, it’s a very nostalgic dish to Hildebrandt, who spent his young professional life learning the art of tableside and silver service.
The feast at Eleven BarrackDion Georgopoulos
In Good Food’s Restaurant of the Year, Eleven BarrackDion Georgopoulos
Over the years, the way they both approach their businesses has changed. These days, they’re more about pleasing their customers and building a good staff culture. “We never used to think about that at all,” says Hildebrandt as we make ourselves comfortable at our final stop: Bentley Restaurant and Bar. “It was just about trying to invest in service and wine.”
When Bentley moved into the city in 2013, it was a big shift in tone. The grand building, with its dark, plush palette, felt almost like a confessional with a sleek, naturalist menu and very, very good wine. Hildebrandt has kept the empty bottles he’s been particularly proud of serving over the years: Clos de la Roche, Chambertin, Cote Rotie, Cornas.The sommelier’s equivalent to serial killer trophies.
To make it onto a Nick Hildebrandt list, the wines must be interesting, have a story, be handmade, and where possible, also organic and biodynamic. Each sommelier in the group follows just one house rule: “Don’t buy shit wine.”
Old recipe cardsDion Georgopoulos
Savage brings out an ancient, cracked box stuffed with hundreds of recipe cards. Some are so faded, the writing has all but disappeared. Each card represents a single element on the plate. He reckons a dessert such as the liquid pineapple captured inside a chocolate tube, with a soft chocolate twist, pineapple gels and pineapple sorbet, would never make it on the menu in 2026 – it would require hiring an extra person just to execute all the elements.
1 / 6Brent Savage.Dion Georgopoulos
3 / 6Nick Hildebrand.Dion Georgopoulos
4 / 6The Murray cod Wellington: tuna mousse set inside a fillet of Murray cod, wrapped in finely chopped mushroom, swaddled in pastry and baked until golden.Dion Georgopoulos
5 / 6IN the kitchen with King Clarence ane Ashe executive chef Khanh Nguyen.Dion Georgopoulos
6 / 6Drinking Chartreuse slushies, which they’ll be pouring at their new Vespertine bar. Dion Georgopoulos
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How do you say goodbye to a place like Bentley? You don’t. This is just a break in transmission until Savage and Hildebrandt decide on the next chapter, which starts with a sabbatical of at least a year for the fine diner. “The restaurant needs a bloody rest,” says Savage. “It has been thrashed.”
They’re hoping Bentley 3.0 will finally win them a third hat and Restaurant of the Year. As to where they’re thinking about opening it, well, they’re keeping shtum. “There’s one site in particular,” says Savage, “but it’s a long shot.”
Bentley Restaurant and Bar will close on August 29. Book its 20-year menu here.