Not every memorable restaurant depends on novelty or surprise. Sometimes what stays with you is something simpler: excellent cooking that never strains for attention, a room that invites conversation, and hospitality that feels unscripted. Set against Manila’s dining scene, which has embraced elaborate tasting menus, Brontë feels refreshingly assured. Chef Wade Watson’s newest restaurant (co-owned with Derek Ramsay) inside La Reserve, atop Makati’s Levanto Building, is comfortable with itself. The room is elegant and chic, but also stylishly informal. The ease is unmistakably Australian, and so is the menu, in the way modern Australian cooking has evolved over the past three decades, borrowing freely from European technique and Mediterranean generosity while remaining anchored by exceptional produce. What’s interesting about Australia is that it doesn’t need to define itself through culinary orthodoxy; the approach is straightforward: choose good ingredients and treat them well. Watson describes his cooking as “quality, refined, and..
