The Grand Hotel Richmond Dining Room
333 Burnley st, Richmond
03 9429 2530

We were house hunting around Richmond area and so we decided to try to gauge the local scene. Feeling tired and cold from the horrible rain, we ducked into a dark, tired looking pub with had a Good Food Guide 2011 sign stuck on the door. What we discovered later was that there is actually a pretty decent looking dining room hidden behind next door, and THAT’s where the award winning meals are cooked.

We chose a 2-course lunch express menu with a glass of wine ($35). Whenever I have these 2 course lunch express I am always in a dilemma: should I choose entree + main or main+ dessert? Most of the time I feel like the entree + dessert, but everyone will think that I am nuts if I ask whether I can order that! Since I was with hubby I pulled a sneaky and asked him to order entree+main and I order main + dessert. Hee hee.

A nice surprise was that after the meals were ordered, the waitress promptly gave us really beautiful crusty bread with a big plate of olives and butter. Since I was starving (and actually when was I EVER not starving?), it was very much appreciated. Alan’s steamed mussels and clams entree arrived fairly quickly. The sauce was beautiful and it has a kick of tomatoey spiciness that we both love. Thank goodness those breads are apparently limitless refills, because we had to mop up almost every drop of the yummy sauce.

The mussels were also extremely plump and fresh. Sadly, we can’t say the same for the clams. For one, it’s extremely gritty. Have they soaked the clams long enough to make sure that all the sand are eliminated? Eating one of those was like eating a mouthful of sand. YUCK. The clams were the freshest either, which is quite a disappointment because I do love clams.

Hubby’s main is Minute steak with porcini butter, rocket & shoe-string fries.  I wasn’t allowed to try too much of his meat, but from what I tried the steak tasted great, it was a nice and tender piece of meat and it was seasoned well.  Hubby had it with mustard, but really, there was really no need to add anything cos it was beautiful on its own.  The fries are also awesome, it wasn’t oily at all and I believe the particular type of potato they use makes the difference.  YUM

Hrm, sadly I can’t say the same with my pasta ragu.  First off, it was slightly underseasoned, but nothing a little pinch of Murray River Pink salt that was on offer can’t fix.  What they can’t fix was the temperature of this dish.  Did they just left the dish sitting there while making hubby’s dish?  The top of the pasta was a bit cold, that being said the layers below were at least fairly warm.  The last disappointment was the pasta itself.  Some were nicely al dente, but some are so overcooked that it’s falling apart.  It’s just so disappointing, especially when it  is in the Good Food Guide.

The dessert was a bit disasterous too.  Italian doughnut filled with cinnamon & honey mascarpone served with custard apple ice cream sounded so delicious, but somehow the flavours just didn’t really mix.  The doughnut was oily and the honey that is drizzled all over the plate tasted wayyyyyyyy too strong.

Overall it was quite a mediocre lunch.  That being said I really wanted to try the other bits of the menu cos it looks so good on the other table and the other guests seemed to be enjoying it.  Maybe I will think about it next time I am in that area.  5.5/10