Bleakhouse Hotel Albert Park — Restaurant in Melbourne

Ambience: Front sports bar has some large TVs and booths alongside with individual TVs in them for watching other games with friends. Unexpectedly, the rear has a beautiful contrasting quieter pub/restaurant area with a view on to the bay. Stylish fit out, modernised version of classic dark wood/leather, appropriate lighting. It really looks great.

Staff: Warm and attentive.

Drinks: Several beers on tap, pretty standard selection, no stout. Some interesting wines by the glass, priced $11-14. Good local bubbles (Mitchelton) and Laurent Perrier for fizz. A few classic cocktails offered.

Food: Great looking menu with a well-curated British-leaning selection of elevated pub classics and steaks.

Specific dishes tried: Chips: outstandingly good. Would come back just for these 5+/5 Barnsley chop: Delighted to see on the menu. Perfectly cooked pink, a joyous piece of lamb. 5/5 (Weirdly came with bearnaise like the steaks do, but this was safely contained in a sauceboat that could be put to one side) “Proper pie” and mash: proper indeed, good shortcrust pastry, chunks of meat, good mash and gravy. Let down by heavy-handedness with rosemary etc that dominated too much - tasted minty rather than meaty - those flavours would have gone better with the lamb chop 4/5 Apple pie: Apple turnover shaped, and unexpectedly seemed fried (air fried perhaps) rather than baked. Not really doing it credit to say this but it seemed like a kind of cheffed up version of the apple pies you get in McDonalds. It was absolutely delicious, cinnamony and crisp. But I was kind of looking forward to a more classic pie, so only 4/5. Sticky date pudding: Good but not quite bang on (more butterscotch, and simply pairing with vanilla ice cream for some needed contrast would have...

My partner and I met at the bleak house in 2020 and we return every year for our anniversary. This year as we entered the venue no one attended to us , we directed ourselves to the “reserved table”. 30 mins later still no one greeted us for a welcome, Menus or asked if we would like a drink. Upon going to the bar to eventually attempt to order our food, our slight requests to alter the meal were all denied. The only sauce for steaks and lamb chops is bearnaise sauce (not everyone can have a creamy sauce) or would make a chicken gravy for our lamb chops .this is from an executive chef. No exactly ideal !! We did not order and left to attend to “The Graham hotel” which was a 12 out of 10 for food and service ! Unfortunately we won’t be returning to the bleakhouse which is such a shame since it held a significance to our relationship and we were hoping to have our engagement in their venue this year. The bleakhouse needs to improve their customer service .. it may explain why the venue is empty most...

Been in this pub quite a few times now, it's a really cool place opposite the beach.. Bright and airy with a good vibe. Eaten here a couple of times, the food is OK, nothing amazing but quite expensive, I guess you pay for location. The thing that really let's the place down is the staff, they're mostly young and trendy and good looking. That's all well and good as far as it goes but they spend most of the time chatting to each other, it seems they're doing us paying customers a favour by serving us. Even as they're preparing the drinks their attention is on chatting to their friends. The drink is on the bar they press the buttons on the machine and walk away to continue their conversation. There's absolutely ZERO interaction with the customer.. I hope the owner of this bar reads this review and perhaps introduces a little staff training on the niceties of customer service. It really does make a HUGE difference to us...