Sourcing Seafood at The Cut

The Cut may be known for its beef, but sourcing the seafood menu demands an entirely different kind of judgement. Rather than ordering the same species week after week, our chefs work with the rhythm of the market, choosing according to the catch, the season and the price on the day.

That process begins at 4.30am, when the clocks start moving at the Sydney Fish Market.

Bought at the crack of dawn

Sydney’s seafood trade begins before dawn, on a clock that runs backwards.

At the Sydney Fish Market auction, prices start above what a crate is expected to fetch and fall until a buyer stops the clock. More than 100 buyers work the floor. Around 1,000 crates — roughly 20 tonnes — change hands every hour, drawn from more than 100 species on any given morning.

The Dutch auction was borrowed from the 17th-century Amsterdam tulip trade, and it rewards nerve. Wait too long and the crate goes to someone else. Move too early and you have paid a few dollars more than you needed to.

Three clocks run simultaneously to keep the volume moving, every weekday from 4.30am.

Why a standing order doesn’t hold

A standing order asks the ocean to be predictable. It fixes the species and the price days ahead of the catch.

Weather closes fishing grounds. A species comes on, peaks and thins out within a few weeks. A boat lands something better than what was written down.

Buying daily changes the question the kitchen is answering. Not “what did we order?” but “what is good this morning?”

Three suppliers, not one

The Cut works with three seafood suppliers rather than relying on one.

GetFish is based at the Sydney Fish Market, sourcing from the auction floor and its own Australian fishing vessels. Joto is a specialist wholesaler with a wide range and consistent access to seasonal produce. Cummings Seafood works directly with Australian fishers and the market, and has done so for decades.

Three suppliers means three answers to the same morning. Our chefs choose between them according to seasonality, freshness and what the market is actually charging that day.

The other half of the menu

Beef at The Cut ages for weeks behind glass at 0–2°C. The seafood is chosen the morning you eat it.

One is a question of patience. The other is a question of timing. Neither begins with a purchase order written a week in advance. That is also why the fish can change between one visit and the next.

Ask what came in this morning. Reserve your table at The Cut via link above.

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