Domaine Chandon – a day in the Yarra Valley

It’s not too often that my other half and I get to spend time together lunching over the weekend.  So I got tired of daily routine and was craving the country side, sun and good food.

We allocated one Saturday to wining and dining in the Yarra Valley with our focus set on Healesville’s Innocent Bystander.  We arrived there after a short drive through the stunning countryside but unfortunately were not able to get a table.  Such a shame really, it looks fantastic! (FYI: the bakery section of this place is unbelievable – it is a spectacle it itself!)

So, off we went back into my little red car back down the highway towards one of my favourite spots in the Valley – Domaine Chandon.

If you have never been to this winery before, go!  The location is simply spectacular and it makes me happy to just sit and enjoy.  This time round, my other half and I were a little hungry (especially after viewing the Turkish bread at Innocent Bystander) and decided to share some tapas sized dishes along with a tasting of the Chandon sparkling wine range.

Because it turned into a beautiful summer’s afternoon, we felt inspired to order light meals, oysters with a lime, shallot and coconut dressing, a tomato bruschetta with buffalo mozzarella, a summer salad of corn, cabbage and green beans and an antipasto platter.

I requested that our meals come one after the other to ensure that our space at our table wasn’t minimised any further after receiving our sparkling wine tasting (see picture above).  Clearly that request was ignored as our oysters, bruschetta and salad arrived simultaneously.  We had to reshuffle everything on our table to ensure that I didn’t have to eat with my plate on my lap! The waitress didn’t really play a helpful role and just left.  We dismissed the poor waiting effort and dug into our oysters, which were lovely albeit a little too creamy.  But overall they were fresh, very tasty and served cold (as they should be!).  Note: They can only be served in a set of 4 or 8…Not the usual dozen or half dozen.

               

The corn, cabbage and green bean salad was not something that inspired me on the menu and failed to inspire me even more once I tasted it.  My other half loves corn and ordered it purely to enjoy fresh sweet corn.  He and I were quite disappointed as each vegetable had been par boiled and put together with a little dressing.

Another disappointment was the bruschetta.  I just don’t understand how people can get it so wrong.  Traditionally, bruschetta is fresh tomato with basil, EV olive oil and a hint of garlic.  Most Melbourne restaurants/ cafes use red onion, which I can sort of deal with.  Chandon has it all wrong.  Small greenhouse tomato’s (hello, it’s summer – tomato season, they should not be coming from a greenhouse, but from a beautiful lush country garden!) were warmed (totally not ok) and dressed with balsamic and sprinkled with basil and torn mozzarella.  The tomatoes were not sweet and were swimming in too much of their own juices.  This dish again, failed to impress me in more ways than one and I would not recommend it at all.  I later asked the waitress, out of curiosity, whether the tomatoes were meant to be served warm, she confirmed that was the style of the dish.  I was horrified.

We had a break from eating all those dishes, and focused on our wine tasting selection.  We both agreed that the two best were the Pinot Shiraz and of course the Vintage Brut.  And in amongst all that drinking, we realised that our antipasto platter had not yet arrived.  We enquired with a different waitress this time who apologized and got on to it straight away.  Within 15 minutes our platter had arrived and to compensate us for our delayed meal, we were offered us a free drink.  Much better service!

The platter was nice, it had some decent preserved vegetables, olives and cured meats but the bread was a little unimpressive.  Again, I think being in a beautiful region like the Yarra Valley, restaurants need to live up to the expectations of those who travel there.  Overall though, in its entirety it wasn’t as disappointing as the previous two dishes, it was stock standard.

Naturally, my womanly instincts kicked in and I wanted dessert (to share of course!).  There was a range of cakes available at the counter, which I happily picked the pear and almond tart.  It was delicious and enjoyable.  The pastry and the frangipane were simply beautiful with the thinly sliced pear.

Overall, my experience at Domaine in terms of food was unacceptable. I feel that this winery is lucky to have such beautiful surroundings.  If this aspect is taken out of the equation what you have left is a very bland and uninspiring menu.  I will return again, but next time only for the Pinot Shiraz, the pear tart and the view.