The New Kind of Assembly

Assembly. It was once that dreaded weekly ritual involving droning speeches and awkward singing. You couldn’t pay us to go back to those stuffy school halls – but now there’s a new Assembly in town, and it’s got people lining up to get inside.

Assembly is a brand new CBD restaurant inside the cool cluster of restaurants, bars and hole-in-the-wall takeaways that make up Regent Place, aka the building next to the Town Hall cinemas. Yes, there is a bar across the hallway that’s also called Assembly – the moody, industrial-chic space has been serving killer cocktails to the after work crowd for a few years and they decided to get a little more serious with a fully fledged, grown up restaurant next door.

The wood-fire stone oven takes pride of place

Assembly, the restaurant, is definitely no no-frills Italian joint. It’s chic and seriously sleek – Italian marble (the cool kind), recycled Tasmanian timber, concrete light fittings – and a bar that’s fully stocked, with the wood fire oven tucked behind it.

The wood-fire stone pizza oven is the only one of its kind in Sydney CBD and with a menu by chef Nick Pulcher, boy does it get a workout. The extensive pizza menu is split into tomato and white sauce based varieties – Naples chef Antonia Buonomo mans the oven and his pizzas range from a classic Margherita and Quattro Formaggi (cheese and more cheese) to Salumi (ham, hot salumi, mild salumi, sausage).

The burrata salad is a must!

While you peruse the pizza menu, order a few starters to whet your appetite – delicate zucchini flowers are plump with ricotta and the burrata salad is next level cheese heaven. The plump burrata bun bursts open onto heirloom tomatoes and soaked bread. Order some extra bread to soak up the juices.

After you’ve demolished the pizza, which is cooked to order and arrived hot and heavily laden with toppings, ready to burst like that burrata. Take a moment to regroup then get ready for smooth pistachio gelato courtesy of RivaReno Gelato and a glass of tiramisu.