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Tuesday 22 May 2012

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Go West

From glamorous back-street bars in Perth to charming beachside tea houses by the ocean and classic degustation menus in the Margaret River, Western Australia is quickly establishing itself as the country’s latest culinary hot spot.

BY Laura Bond | Oct 21, 2011

Click here to view a gallery of images from Laura's Western Australian getaway.

Cruising high above the Australian outback, I’m glued to a documentary about French cuisine playing on the aeroplane seat back. The film is focusing on the late Bernard Loiseau’s renowned Burgundy restaurant, La Côte d’Or, and the reporter is sampling frog legs and snails, neither of which I've tried. “Like adult lollipops really,” he says with pure joy written  all over his face.

So it is to my surprise just an hour after landing in Perth, under the shade of a 160-year-old grapevine, I’m being recommended the snails in Burgundy butter, accompanied by roast marrow and brioche. Sandalford winery cellar door supervisor Max Mantecon enthuses their goodness and I agree to try them. The reporter was right. A lot like adult lollipops.

Paired with a glass of the vineyard’s famous Prendiville, and followed by a red pepper piperade and English spinach tart, my first ever meal in Western Australia has set the bar very high for the remainder of my five-day trip. And I haven’t even had dessert; an assiette of local strawberries, panna cotta with rose jelly, and a sparkling strawberry shooter with schnapps sabayon, all wolfed down in record time.

I’m about to embark on a culinary journey taking in the best of Western Australia’s south, beginning in Perth, and winding down the Indian Ocean to the Margaret River, stopping to admire the lazy sea-change towns dotted along the way.

VIBRANT PERTH

Tonight I’m fortunate to be in the hands of Ryan Mossny, director of Two Feet and a Heartbeat, a newly formed company conducting a range of walking tours throughout the central city.

Laced with tales of the inner city’s history, our tour is taking in a selection of bars and clubs and the first stop is Canton Lounge Bar. Originally built in 1903 as a Chinese restaurant, the building still retains many of its original ornate features, including a pressed-tin ceiling, but has since been converted into a large open-plan drinking hole popular with the after-work crowd.

Perth’s inner city has undergone something of a transformation in the past year as a result of the city relaxing its liquor licensing laws, allowing smaller pubs to gain licences, Mossny says. The result is a myriad of funky, Melbourne-style wine bars opening in newly renovated laneways and back streets including Helvetica, where we swing by for their signature drink, Fish House Punch, a concoction of Appleton VX rum, Hennessey VS cognac, peach liqueur, sparkling wine, lemon, sugar, and soda, all served in a mismatch of vintage glasses.

Our next stop is Greenhouse, the permanent home for Joost Bakker’s pop-up restaurant from Melbourne. Built in under six weeks from sustainable and recycled materials, this venue reflects a menu equally as quirky and organic.

Despite being dwarfed by the surrounding high-rise buildings, herbs and vegetables are grown on the roof, which also doubles as an open-top bar. The exterior is covered in dozens of terracotta pots with vines twisting and winding their way up the steel meshing. Chairs are made from old road signs, the walls are insulated with straw and the liquor bottles hang from old bailing twine. Ice buckets are made from old gas cylinders, reclaimed fencing wire is wound into intricate light shades, and discarded plastic pallets are set in recycled concrete creating a unique yet warm and inviting feel. Tonight I’m opting for a delicious cabbage, mint and pomegranate salad, and seared duck breast with plum and witlof.

Further uptown in the city’s trendy Mount Lawley bar district, a tall, dark and handsome Frenchman asks if I’d prefer the Bollinger or the Dom Pérignon. Rest assured it’s not every day that I get this sort of approach; mind you, it’s not every day that I stumble across a champagne bar hidden behind a heavy black door and up a dark staircase.

I resist the temptation – of the champagne choices that is – instead opting for something a little different, the 1996 Duval-Leroy Brut while I quiz the dapper Gregor as to how he ended up in Perth. The French national’s love of champagne is in his veins he tells me.

Originally from the Reims, in the Champagne region in France, Gregor visited Perth on holiday and fell in love. It took Must Wine Bar little convincing that he was the man to run their indulgent and opulent Champagne Lounge. The atmosphere is jubilant and lively as we sample decadent chicken liver parfait and grenache jelly on Melba toast.

NATURAL CHARMS

I’d been warned Western Australia in January would be hot and I’m not disappointed. The skies are bright and clear as we head for Kings Park, the city’s sprawling reserve overlooking the Swan River. It is there we are met by Greg Nannup. An indigenous tour guide, Nannup is not only passionate about the park where his ancestors once resided but extremely knowledgeable.

The 400-hectare haven, and one of the largest inner-city parks in the world, Kings Park comprises native bushland with pockets of manicured gardens. All year round visitors enjoy the postcard panoramas stretching from the Swan River across the city to the picturesque Darling Range.

Nannup tells us nothing much has changed in the park over the generations. Before European settlement, he says, Perth’s Noongar people used the park’s expansive views for weddings and celebrations, just as it is used today.

Looking down on the Swan River, the glistening water becomes ever tempting as we finally head west for my first dip in the Indian Ocean at Cottesloe Beach. But not before we refuel at the iconic Indiana. Originating in 1910, the popular tea house serves as the perfect place for lunching with commanding views out to the better-than-its-name-suggests Rottnest Island.

Beyond Cottesloe, Perth’s residents have 14 city beaches to choose from – the perfect relief from the balmy, dry climate that helps give this metropolitan city its relaxed holiday feel. Inspired by the seaside setting I indulge in the tempura soft-shell crab with chilli and lime dipping sauce with a side of chargrilled asparagus, egg, mustard, olive oil, rocket and parmesan. Just the thing to get me in the mood for a refreshing ocean dip.

COASTAL COMFORTS

It’s an easy drive from Perth to the Margaret River. The straight highway provides opportunities to visit buzzing local towns that ooze family holiday charm, such as Busselton and its famous jetty. At 1.8 kilometres, it is the longest timber jetty in the southern hemisphere, and is fresh out of a $27 million refurbishment program.

It’s just 40 years since the first vines were planted in the Margaret River region and in the short space of time has managed to cement itself as one of the world’s great fine wine-producing regions. Boasting some 200 vineyards, fabulous surf breaks, and gourmet food joints, our first stop is not a vineyard but the Margaret River itself.

With the help of the enthusiastic and ever knowledgeable Sean Blocksidge of The Margaret River Discovery Company we’re helped into canoes for a leisurely paddle on the river. It’s a picture perfect day on the mighty Margaret River, the life-blood of the region, nourishing thousands of acres of fertile land that produces some of the world’s finest vintages. Birds serenade us, crickets chirp and fish jump. The only other sound is my rumbling stomach.

Blocksidge’s small-group tour company that runs “tours for people who don’t do tours”, has been something of a success story. For the past three years, Blocksidge’s tours have been rated number one in the region and last year, the number one tour in the whole country by Trip Advisor. He is perhaps the region’s greatest ambassador and he happily rattles off a litany  of facts and figures about the region, speaking  as if the area was his own.

A FINE DROP

Blocksidge is keen to show us the best of the  region and takes us to one of his favourite spots, Cape Mentelle, and introduces us to Rob Mann, the vineyard’s senior winemaker. The vineyard staff are cleaning up from the vineyard's Movies  in the Vineyard evening that runs over the summer months in the leafy grassed area at  the cellar door.

Designed for the true wine buff, Mann gives us a behind-the-scenes tour of the vineyard culminating in a food and wine-pairing experience amid $6 million of wine ageing in oak barrels. I’m not sure if it’s a result of the energy I expended during the early morning paddle that has me devouring the degustation-style menu at a rate of knots or if it is because it is possibly some of the best food I have ever tried. Matched perfectly with six of the best Cape Mentelle wines, the $70 price tag is worth it for the food alone.

It’s all over too soon and we head back to the cliff-side Injidup Spa Retreat, a resort comprising of 10 villas, each with private heated plunge pools, hidden among 1200 hectare of the Leeuwin-Naturaliste National Park. Blocksidge pulls off to the side of the road and we get out of the car in an isolated spot. He leads us to the edge of the Yallingup cliff, where he presents us sweet local honeys to sample.

As we gaze out to the breaking waves and picture perfect coastline, Blocksidge tells us ‘Yallingup’ is an aboriginal word that means ‘place of love’. There is wisdom in his words, for this is definitely a place that is easy to love.

HOT SPOTS: Perth

EAT

Greenhouse

100 St Georges Terrace,

Perth; 08 9481 8333

greenhouseperth.com

Indiana Cottesloe Beach

99 Marine Parade,

Cottesloe 08 9385 5005

indiana.com.au

STAY

The Richardson  Hotel & Spa