Anyone who has tackled fiery Sichuan mountains like Chongqing chicken before, needling chopsticks through the pile of dried chillies and numbing peppercorns to extract pieces of fried bird, will be less terrified by the sizzling chilli fish at Sun Kitchen, Albert Park's new high-end Cantonese/Sichuan restaurant. They'll realise the bark is worse than the bite, even if the gigantic bowl arrives with so many crimson bombs shrouding the fish that it resembles a food-based commentary on the plastic crisis plaguing the oceans.

Relax. A server presents the sizzling dish, pauses for dramatic effect (photos), then allows another waiter to scoop most of the hollow chillies and whole Sichuan peppercorns off. If only the Pacific garbage patch was as easy to fix. Or as delicious. Beneath, the ultra-tender fillets have heat and numbing zing, but it's a thrill, not a kill. If anything, the meat is buttery, the thatches of bean sprouts and cucumber in the broth beneath refreshing.

This complex elegance, and theatrical delivery is why you might want to pay attention to Sun Kitchen. The two-storey building on Albert Park lake used to house the Point. This upstairs area is now nine private dining rooms. The lower level (previously Hidden Jade) is where the action goes down over fresh, plush carpets, at large, linen-clad tables indicating how many people are optimal for tackling the refined dual-region menu.

As you enter, hostesses in headsets point out the essentials: toilets to your right, tanks of rock lobsters, primed for despatch, on the left. Your table waiters (plural) instruct you to choose which of your two chopstick sets, black or white, you will use to pluck from the shared plates and which to put in your mouth. They deliver hot towels, thimbles of a jasmine and gin cocktail and seasoned nuts while explaining the rich and spicy nature of their Sichuan dishes and the subtler thrills of the Cantonese.