"Malcolm Hanslow's two-hat Ainslie degustation, named ACT Restaurant of the Year — book the seven courses to mark an anniversary."
Pilot sits behind the local shops in Ainslie, a 24-seat room with a small terrace run by Dash Rumble and Ross McQuinn with chef Malcolm Hanslow. Since opening it has held two chef's hats and been named the ACT's best restaurant at the Gourmet Traveller awards — its third such win in four years.
It is the clearest argument for Canberra as a serious dining city, and a fixture on our tasting-menu guide.
There is no à la carte — the kitchen serves a single seven-course degustation, currently $140 a head, built by Malcolm Hanslow and Syed Rashid around produce, memory and the people they have cooked with. Hanslow's résumé runs through Automata, Oscillate Wildly and Ester, and a shortlisting for the 2018 Josephine Pignolet Young Chef award.
The wine list is all-Australian, paced to the menu. For a more relaxed Canberra dinner, Lunetta and Courgette are the alternatives.
The dining room is small and warm rather than grand — 24 seats, an open pass, and the kind of pacing that only works when the kitchen controls every cover. The set menu makes the evening feel less like ordering and more like being cooked for.
For a waterside Canberra room with a view, Waters Edge trades intimacy for the lake.
Pilot is made for an anniversary or a proposal: a tiny, attentive room, a long set menu and a sense that the night is the event. The intimacy that suits a couple also makes it a memorable, if intense, table to close a deal across.
Not for big groups, à la carte browsers or fussy eaters — there's one set seven-course menu in a 24-seat room, take it or leave it.
The seven-course degustation is currently $140 per person, with optional all-Australian wine pairings on top. There is no à la carte option.
Head chef Malcolm Hanslow, who runs Pilot with owners Dash Rumble and Ross McQuinn. He previously cooked at Automata, Oscillate Wildly and Ester.
Two. It has also been named ACT Restaurant of the Year at the Gourmet Traveller awards, one of three best-restaurant wins in four years.
At 1 Wakefield Gardens, behind the local shops in Ainslie, Canberra ACT 2612. The dining room seats just 24.
Yes. With only 24 seats and a single set menu, Pilot books well ahead and does not take walk-ins. Reserve through its website.
A 24-seat room — reserve early; the set menu means no walk-ins.
Affiliate disclosure: Restaurants for Kings may earn a commission when you book through our reservation links, at no cost to you. Our scores are editorial and never paid for.
Where a 24-seat Ainslie room sits on our tasting-menu guide, judged on the cooking, the pacing and the occasion it fits.
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