South West WA Trip - Day:
1 2 3Blue Ginger Fine Foods, Margaret River
For breakfast, CB and I headed near the town centre to Blue Ginger Fine Foods, which has a cafe and a little shop with small goods. I had a latte and Big Breakfast. The breakfast included poached eggs (fried and scrambled were offered I think), bacon, mushrooms, beans, tomatoes, breakfast sausage and a heap of toast. A slice of watermelon was served on the side. The food was quite good, the bacon was crunchy, eggs yolks slightly runny and the sausage had good flavour. It did go cold quickly, as we were seated outside, and the butter was served out of the fridge (and not very spreadable).
After breakfast, we ventured to the Mammoth Cave, Margaret River Cheese Factory, Margaret River Chocolate Factory and Providore.
Olio Belio, Cowaramup
After the caves, cheese, chocolate and "small goods" tastings, I wasn't very hungry. So when we stopped at Olio Belio (a olive grove in the region), I opted for a light lunch. I was going to try the special of the day, a Moussaka, but opted instead for a Leccino pizza. This consisted of Olio Belio's pasta sauce, kalamata olives, cherry tomatoes, along with mushrooms, thyme, garlic, onion and goats cheese. It was served with a house extra virgin olive oil and English spinach.
The pizza was a little fiddly to eat due to the absence of mozzarella. But it was quite good, and substantial enough to keep my stomach happy. The free filtered rain water tasted fine too and washed down the pizza well. While we were waiting for our food, and whilst eating, CB and I played a couple of games of Checkers (there were a number of board games around, most likely for the kids). It was one game a piece but decided it was time to go.
After stopping off back at the apartment to put some cheese in the fridge, we then headed to Amazen. Here there was a giant hedge maze, along with a smaller "turn left only" maze and a stepping stone puzzle.
Yahava Koffee Works, Margaret RiverAfter the mazes, we stopped off at a coffee place nearby. The affogatos were relatively cheap ($4) and had a scoop of the local icecream (Simmos). This coffee was strong and a little too bitter for my liking.
With a little time to kill, CB and I headed to The Berry Farm. They had a selection of wines and small goods, but the small goods weren't tastable unlike the other venues. CB tasted and bought a couple of wines, along with some mango butter.
Gnarabar, Gnarabup BeachIt turns out Xanadu is not open for dinner any day, so CB and I decided to go to the restaurant at the place we were staying. It turned out to be a good decision too, both of us left very satisfied with our choices. My choices were porkalicious, I liked the sound of both pork dishes for entree and mains, so decided to have both.
I started with the "Crispy skinned masterstock porkbelly, chilli & tamarind sauce, asian greens, crispy shallots & coriander salad." The pork was quite tender, and teamed with the chilli, tamarind sauce and shallots, was really good. Some cut chillis also provided a really good kick of heat. The coriander was OK, I'm not being a big fan of it at the best of times but I ate it all in this dish.
Following up was the "Herb crusted plantaganet pork cutlet, pancetta braised sticky lentils, baby spinach, duck fat roasted potatoes & braised red cabbage." This was fantastic. The pork was cooked pink in the centre (risky as most people like it cooked all the way through). The sauce was rich and went well with the pork, the cabbage cut through the fat and richness of it all. The roast potatoes weren't as crispy (they were sitting in the sauce), but was very tasty as they had absorbed some duck fat goodness and the sauce. The pancetta, lentils and spinach all were good. All in all, a very good dish, and at $30 (even less with the Ent Book), very good value.
To finish, I chose the "Eton Mess - crisp meringue, rhubarb cream, strawberries & macadamia nut icecream." The icecream could've had more nuts but was creamy and smooth. The meringue was crunchy and the strawberries and rhubarb was tart enough to compliment. I would've liked some cream (I thought cream would've come with the rhubarb, but I guess it meant creamed rhubarb).
To start off with, CB and I shared some chips. This was served with aioli which wasn't very strong in the garlic department. CB also had some olives and feta but me not being a fan of olives, didn't have any. The chips were served hot.
For mains, I tried the seafood paella. It was described as "Fresh
local
seafood;
calamari,
fish,
prawns,
mussels,
clams,
cacciatore
sausage
&
snow
peas
in
a saffron
rice
." This was quite good, although I would've preferred a slightly bigger serving. It definitely was tasty enough though and I quite enjoyed it.
I also had a lemon lime and bitters which was quite refreshing. Other peoples drinks however took awhile to come and some were ho hum. Service was a little slow, we had to flag down staff to order our food and for drinks.
