If you’ve driven the stretch out to Suffolk Park, you may have passed it without quite knowing it was there. Forest sits inside luxury resort Crystalbrook Byron, set against 45 acres of subtropical rainforest, and for a long time that setting was its best-kept secret. Locals sometimes assumed it was for resort guests only. It never was. The table has always been open to anyone who books it.
This winter, Forest comes back from a full refurbishment. Sunlight finds more corners now. Marble-topped tables, timber chairs and woven rattan sit beneath a cluster of pale sculptural pendants, and the paperbark trunks still rise straight through the verandah floor, the way they always have. ‘The beauty was always there,’ says general manager Scott Ratcliffe. ‘We just opened the windows a little wider.’
The menu leans harder than ever into what grows nearby. The herb garden is a short stroll from the pass. Four beehives sit on the grounds. Seven Subpods turn kitchen scraps back into soil. When the chefs talk about Northern Rivers provenance, they mean it literally. The paddock down the road. The grower they know by name.
Slipper lobster arrives torched and brightened with preserved lemon and salted caper macadamia crumb. A twice-baked Nimbin Monte Nardi cheese soufflé sits somewhere between comfort and craft. For dessert, textures of lemon: pistachio crumb, lemon balm and lemon sorbet, a celebration of Northern Rivers citrus at its peak.
The drinks list keeps the same local thread. The Smoked Gum Gimlet leans on Brookie’s Byron gin, quandong and finger lime. The Saltbush Sour is a native take on the Piña Colada. Nothing travels far to reach the glass.
Bifold doors open onto the shaded verandah. Cicadas through the afternoon, frogs at dusk, and a green wall of rainforest close enough to hear.
Forest was always here. Now there’s every reason to stop.
Visit crystalbrookcollection.com/byron/forest.
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