Little Gan's (Willetton)

Quick Links

• Before Reading
• The details
• Before visiting
• @littlegansperth

Before reading ❗️

The details 📝

The team

Little Gan's, is a small restaurant serving up modern Australian cuisine in the quiet southern neighbourhood of Willetton. The doors to Little Gan's quietly opened in late April 2022, with the venue seating around twenty.

Chef-owner Richard Gan is no stranger to hospitality. Like myself, he began his life in hospitality helping out at his parents' Chinese restaurant in his early teens. An external placement landed him his first professional kitchen job at Marea - a two starred Michelin restaurant in New York. His culinary education was completed at none other than the Culinary Institute of America - the same place Anthony Bourdain (RIP) once attended. After finishing his education in the Culinary Institute of America, he worked at a number of small restaurants in America before moving to Melbourne, after landing a job at Stokehouse, in St. Kilda.

Assisting Richard in the kitchen is his partner, Tricia Chia. Trish's culinary CV is equally as impressive. Her culinary education was afforded via Le Cordon Bleu in Tokyo, before spending time in the kitchens of Nobu Perth (rotating through the majority of the kitchen), Fleur (sous chef) and spending a brief stint in Melbourne at award winning venue Higher Ground and restaurant-to-retail brand, Calia.

To start

Little Gan's menu is reminiscent of your classic modern Australian fare, full of crudo, pasta and protein mains.

Note we visited during the first night of business during their soft opening period. Plating and portion sizes may have changed since.

We started off with the kingfish which had refreshing flavours, opening the palate for what is to come.

We were sent the salmon, complimentarily from Trish. If you've participated in Chinese New Year dinners, you'll find this flavour and textural combination familiar. It took us some time to realise that the dish reminded us of yee sang, or Prosperity Toss - a dish commonly served during Chinese New Year. A pleasant surprise!

An apparently staple in modern Australian cuisine right now is grilled octopus. The octopus was smokey and tender, and we enjoyed the addition of harissa.

The beef tartare is another classic found on modern Australian menus. The beef had a fresh and silky mouthfeel with a nice tartness. When enjoyed with the crostini, there was a balance between textures.

Strange comparison, but the plate itself, and the chair I used to frame it on, strangely reminds me of a Longines Legend Diver with a brown dial (do shoot us an email or DM on Instagram if you're a watch nerd!).

The mains

For mains, we opted for two pastas, both of which are handmade in-store. Our favourite was the farfelle which was light. The garlic cream and fresh cheese reminded us of a healthier pesto, while the rocket added a fresh element. This balanced out the fatty, smoky and juicy chorizo.

The linguine had a generous number of prawns. Prawn heads were fried and edible.

To finish off, we ordered the Angus striploin which was cooked to medium rare perfection. The black garlic just was beautifully reduced. We do think that the dish would've benefitted from another textural element - perhaps something crunchy or a puree.

Last but not least

Last but not least - dessert. Desserts are all made in-house by Trish - who previously time as a pastry chef in Nobu's kitchen. When Trish isn't at Little Gan's, she operates a dessert business and soon will be opening up a patisserie.

When we dined, two desserts were available - a muscovado cheesecake and a basque cheesecake.

The basque cheesecake was fluffy and rich. Though we did find the $14 price point a bit steep, for a single slice.

Little Gan's is dangerously close to our house. We're glad to have found such excellently crafted food in such a convenient location!

Before visiting 🚙