Lake House Daylesford

Knowing my interest in fine dining, Gaz suggested we dine at the Lake House while at Daylesford. Fortunately we were able to make a reservation for lunch at 1pm the day before.

Lake House is a two Chefs Hat (The Age Good Food Guide) restaurant in Daylesford. The Executive Chef is Alla Wolf Tasker who opened the restaurant in 1984. To have been cooking and maintaining the prestige of the restaurant for such a long time is certainly no mean feat!

Lake House also offers hotel accomodation besides a fine dining experience. The pictures of the rooms on their website looked absolutely dreamy.

When we arrived at the restaurant, we were immediately ushered to a window seat with glimpses of the famed lake. The seating and ambience was very comfortable.

There was only a 2 course lunch at $70 per person option but we got to choose what we wanted to eat from a comprehensive menu. Not a dessert person, I chose an entree of tempura prawns with radish salad and black beans (recommended as a special) and main of John Dory fish with squid ink.

Gaz chose a main of 12 hour suckling pig and dessert of assorted sorbets. The serveperson suggested we order a side dish of vegetables because there were not much veges on the dishes, the ones on the plate mostly serves as garnishing. So we ordered a dish of asparagus and brocollini.

Each table was provided a bowl of bread with unsalted butter, and some olives in oil and bread sticks. One of the parmesan bread sticks I had was very salty but there was also another one flavoured with cumin which was just right. I was not a fan of olives so Gaz had the whole lot to himself.

I liked the crispy nori and prawn but I have to say that my first bite of one of the prawns was NOT GOOD. I think the prawn in question must soaked up too much of the fermented black bean juice because the smell of something akin to preserved 1000 year old egg magnified by 100% + rotten egg immediately overwhelmed me on the first bite. Normally I'm OK with black beans, I even use it in my cooking, so it's all very strange.

Still, the salad on the side was very fresh and the prawn itself was tasty. I just steered clear of the black beans on the plate after the first bite though.


The side of asparagus and brocollini ($9).

Gaz's main of 12 hour suckling pig, tempura quail, blood pudding and asian funghi which was black fungus, lily bulb in a tangy sauce. We both loved the pork (hmm... can't get enough of the crackling) and the quail was nice too.

The funghi salad is tangy, meant to balance the fat of the pork I suppose. I have to say that the pork has a little boar taint even though it is a suckling. But I'm not deterred by this, crackling's the best!

John Dory, squid ink topped with foam. The foam is an apple sauce foam - I would never have guessed. Pardon me, but I don't like foams... they look like saliva on the plate! The black pieces on the plate are squid ink tuile which tasted a little salty. Doesn't the contrasting black and white on the plate look good?

Sorbet - Strawberry, pineapple and lime. My favourite one is the strawberry, it matches the colour of my top.

We waited a long time between the entree and the main, about 1/2 hour... Maybe we were supposed to talk and sip our wine patiently while the chef slaves over the little components on our elaborate mains.... I think we ate a little too quickly. The entree only lasted 1 minute on our table and the mains, maybe 2 1/2 minutes. We were hungry :)

With our bellies full (much help from the bowl of bread and butter), we made our drive back to Melbourne.