I had dinner tonight with a good friend at a new Scandinavian-inspired restaurant in Sydney called “Norsk Dor”. With my interests in all things Scandinavian, but especially Swedish, she thought it wold be a good place for us to catch up.

“It’s only been open three weeks”, our waiter told us, so aside from a few reviews here and there, I’m guessing it’s getting to be known about, largely, through word of mouth.

“Did you hear the wolves on the way in?”, he also asked us, referring to sound effects you hear as you walk the long corridor you need to follow from the entrance on Pitt Street before you actually get to the restaurant. And then you need to press a buzzer before you get in.

“It’s like the gay bar I visited in Latvia on a Tuesday night”, I told my friend.  I then went on to tell her about having to press buttons, secret handshakes and all kinds of weird and wonderful things I encountered during a trip to Riga in 2008. But I digress..

The service, food and wine were excellent.

I wouldn’t call it the most “authentic” Scandinavian experience (more Danish if anything, and the waiters were English and German), I’ve ever had, so don’t go there expecting NOMA-like cuisine, or even anything you might find in the middle of Stockholm. But very, very good.

“It was like Stockholm in the middle of summer”, I told my friend, “full of Germans”.