Now that we are living "North of the river" (anyone from Perth will know what I mean here!) our choices for good places to eat within close range are limited. The further away from the city you go, the less good places there are. However that's not to say that there aren't any at all, its just that there are less.
So we decided to go to White Salt Bar/Cafe/Restaurant. Its about a 15 minute drive from our house and is on the coast road which means you can eat a meal while watching the ocean. I have driven past this place many times since we lived here and its been in the back of my mind to visit at some point. From the outside its actually not much to look at because its on a corner of the road with a bottle shop one side and a BP station the other. However once you go inside its really nice. Big windows all along the front mean that most tables have a view of the water.
We were shown to our table which was right by the window and we were just in time to see the last few minutes of the sun setting. Beautiful. Menus were handed over and the drinks menu was already on the table. Craig has offered to drive on this occasion so I ordered a nice cold glass of chardonnay while Craig had a James Squire Golden Ale (his new favourite beer here in Oz).
The menu was not too big so it made deciding what to order fairly easy. For an entree we settled on the White Salt Tasting Plate for 2 which was a platter of grilled local prawns with garlic butter, shredded pork belly and apple crostini, scallops with celeriac and house smoked duck breast and sesame seed salad.
After a very short wait the plate arrived, looking appetising and delicious. Starting with the prawns they were sweet and tender and cooked perfectly in their shells. The garlic butter was subtle and not at all overpowering. I don't eat scallops so Craig ate all of these and said they were nice although nothing extra special. Nothing wrong with them though. The shredded pork was absolutely delicious and full of flavour. I have been avoiding pork lately as I have noticed it gives me stomach ache but a small portion like this was ok. And lastly the duck. My only gripe with this is that this was sharing plate for two people yet there were only three slices of duck. This meant that we had to decide who was having what. Anyway, the duck was full of flavour and nice and tender and the salad that went with it was a real surprise. Usually the salad is just a garnish but on this occasion it was part of the dish and really made it special. I would of liked this element of the dish as a meal in its own right.
For our main course I had hoped to have something nice and light like a salad (duck?) however most of the menu was fairly rich and heavy. I was surprised to see Rabbit & Mushroom Pie as the weather has been so hot. That's the sort of dish I associate with cooler weather and a nice bottle of red wine.
I had the Marinated Rump of Lamb which was served with boulangere potatoes, caponata and salsa verde. The lamb was served pink which Ilike and was exceptionally tender. I would have liked it to have been seasoned in the kitchen more though and I ended up adding a fair amount of salt and pepper. The potatoes were served as a square cake and were delicious although again there lacked seasoning. Caponata is similar to a ratatouille except all the ingredients are finely diced and the main element is egg plant (aubergine). There are also sultanas in the mix. There was a good heaped spoonful on the plate and went beautifully with the lamb although it was served room temperature and would have preferred it to be hot. The whole dish was dressed with a well flavoured sauce which I think was red wine based. Overall it was a great dish which I would be more than happy to order again despite the few things I picked on.
Craig had the Beef Fillet with Dauphinoise potato, asparagus and red wine jus. The beef was cooked medium rare and again was lovely and tender with great flavour to the meat. The potato was the same as mine and Craig agreed that it needed seasoning. The asparagus was cooked so it still had some bite to it while not being raw. Again overall a really good dish and he cleared his plate which is always a good sign.
The restaurant was very busy and unfortunately we felt that the staff were so busy that we felt a little ignored at times. it took us quite a while to get the attention of one of the waitresses to order some more drinks even though our glasses had been empty for a while before that. and then after we did order them we waited quite a while for the drinks to arrive by which time we had finished our main courses. However when we did see the staff they were all very nice and friendly.
We decided not to have coffee or dessert as we had to go and pick our son up at Hilliary's so we thought we would wait to get a coffee over there to pass the time while we waited for him.
White Salt is open all day and does breakfast and lunch as well. We will return at some point and would recommend it to friends. Ask for a window table as its a great people watching spot.
White Salt
Sharon x
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