Agnes, a contender for Brisbane’s best restaurant, changes up its menu

It’s celebrated nationally for its wood-fired cuisine, so why switch up what’s apparently not broken?

The things that hold us up sometimes eventually weigh us down. It’s a truism that applies to relationships, careers, personal habits.

“Every time I’d be catching up with people, it’s always like, ‘Oh let’s go to Agnes,’” Ben Williamson says. “And it got to the point where I’m like, ‘Oh God, I’ve got to go back to Agnes again.’ You just end up eating the same stuff.”

It might read as a startling admission, but Williamson says it matter-of-factly enough. Anyday, the powerhouse hospitality group of which he’s a co-owner and culinary director, has been on such a tear recently, it’s easy to forget that Agnes – arguably its marquee venue, and a contender for Brisbane’s best restaurant – is just six years old, and it was his first venue as chef-patron.

Williamson talks about it with that candid honesty but affection and care that you might your first child.

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“There was nothing wrong with what we were doing,” he says. “Everything was going really well; there just wasn’t enough change happening – firstly for myself, but then also, I presumed, for the guests.”

Williamson, then, has rung the changes, Agnes relaunching last week with 25 new dishes. That’s more than two-thirds of the Fortitude Valley restaurant’s menu. It was significant enough for Anyday to take it to the media with a press release.

“I think that was because we hadn’t done it in so long,” Williamson says. “We just wanted to get that word out: Agnes is going back to its roots and shedding that whole, ‘we won a tonne of awards and accolades’ thing. That’s not what defines us. We want to get back to an organic changing restaurant for the public.

“It’s to get back to a neighbourhood favourite, as it was always intended, rather than being a special-occasion restaurant … I mean, Agnes trades so strongly, but this gives people more of an ability to dine the way they want to dine.”

Williamson, along with co-owners Frank Li, Bianca Marchi and Tyron Simon, has come off the back of four openings in the past 12 months: Idle, Golden Avenue, The French Exit, and Le Royale. Finally, he had the bandwidth to turn back to the group’s existing venues.

Williamson says to expect Agnes’ menu to more readily evolve with the seasons in the future, and that fellow Fortitude Valley restaurant Bianca is his “next stop”.

“I’ll be there in a couple of weeks after Noosa Food and Wine,” he says.

Williamson also talks about this being a chance to r