Mayura Station — Restaurant in Millicent

My wife and I have been buying Mayura meat for over a decade and while we travel around Australia we made a point of driving 4 hours from Adelaide to experience Mayura Wagyu at the source.

We love to cook it over charcoal and burnt down wood fires whenever we can and I was thrilled to see a charcoal fire as the two chefs prepared all the meat and dishes as we arrived at 6.45.

The smell of the charcoal fire hits you as enter, ringing the dinner bell for any real steak lover.

We were seated at the chefs table and the guys there immediately engaged and entered into conversation with us, making us feel welcome and part of the family. The waiters promptly took our drink order and we settled in, not only anticipating the food, but the show as well.

They did an excellent talk on the origins of Wagyu as far back as 200AD where they were brought back to Japan from China as draught cattle working on the land and over time developing the oxen look that makes Wagyu cattle visually distinctive. From there we fast forwarded to when beef became fashionable for the wealthy, and Wagyu began its contemporary journey to what it is today, and how Mayura Station in turn becomes involved and some other interesting facts about raising Wagyu cattle which I won’t spoil for those looking to experience a wonderful meal here.

The menu consisted of a steak tartare dish with raw egg yolk, cherry smoked eye fillet, and rump cap, with the option to upgrade to tbone which we promptly accepted. All 9+ signature Mayura.

Once we were seated and got our drinks the chefs began searing the tbones right before us, developing the perfect malliard crust.

We had a chat about how to develop that crust, dry meat, good salt, and a charcoal fire that restricted airflow somewhat to reduce flare ups.

If you’ve cooked this meat before on open fire you can really appreciate the practiced art that comes with developing a first class crust without 5 foot flames erupting from the rendering fat while you cook.

It was impressive and I learnt a couple of tricks I’ll take away with me that made it worthwhile without even having the meal.

First up was a char sui Wagyu bite with the classic char sui flavour, only paired with Wagyu instead of pork. Delicious and different.

Entree was steak tartare topped with a raw egg yolk. Room temperature Wagyu that somehow had a rare texture without being cooked and a really nice balance of citrus and other flavours which bonded the whole dish perfectly.

Next up was the cherry smoked eye fillet which again was delicious and for me something different pairing cherry smoke with eye fillet.

Then the star of the show arrived which was an approx 1kg T Bone seared to perfection and expertly sliced in front of the table, and topped again with salt. My wife and I enjoyed sampling both the eye and porterhouse section, but sadly could not finish. Hello tomorrow lunch!

Finally was a raspberry chocolate dessert which perfectly counteracted all the rich marbling flavours with a touch of sweet sourness to leave you feeling fresh.

I highly recommended a meal here at any price, and if you truly love your meats sit at the chefs table and watch and you’ll have a great time and might even learn a...

After reading the reviews here I really wanted to go. I'm going to be brutally honest and tell you that I think the whole thing is a little pedestrian.

There was nothing awful about Mayura, the location is lovely, the set up of the restaurant is fun and the atmosphere is relaxed. But my best comparison for the food is 4 star mid range chain hotel.... about 15 years ago. Sorry.

The wagyu came in all three of the savoury courses but was all cooked the same way, seared. They really missed a trick here, it could have been poached, brined, smoked, sous vide, melted warmed carpaccio, open fire char gilled, slow braised, so many ways to cook it and so many ways to serve it but it was all just seared and served as a big hunk, it would have been so nice to see it rested, thinly sliced and dressed.

The first course a bavette, had good flavour in the beef but the dish was unbalanced with not enough pickled pear and wasabi mayo to compliment the beef and some superfluous flowers for garnish to tart it up but adding nothing to the dish in general.

Second course "zabuton" was my favourite because there were some textural mixes with the potato threads and pomegranate but was a bit heavy handed with the excess togorashi on the plate.

The sirloin for the main course was served just over medium done and under seasoned, sad.

The service was pretty average, wine knowledge from the serving staff was pretty low considering the size of the Wine list, no decent non alcoholic choices either, just bog standard coca cola brand soft drinks.

Dessert was a passionfruit panna cotta with fresh berries, it was okay for what it was but once again, incredibly outdated without any wow factor to finish off the meal.

There is so much more that could be done to showcase this wagyu product for Mayura if more thought was put into each individual cut focusing more on flavours and complimentary textures rather than just making it one big bloody bbq. With a set tasting menu and set dining times this one should be a no brainer to knock out of the park but it was a swing and a miss.

3 out of 5...

2 stars for the really good quality wagyu here. But really want to give 1 star for this restaurant.

1, the earliest and the only one available booking time is 6:45pm, and after a long speech and waiting time ur first course served at 7:40pm. If u still want to come, so recommend u have some food before u come to avoid u would starve urself.

2, If u r so desperate to earn money so we have to choose set menu is really fine. But I thought at least we would have more choice for the main part, in considerate of this is a wagyu farm and people drive far away from everywhere and want to enjoy the best steak here.

So why the best steak has to be a M9 rib eye?

I don’t want to have rump cap for the long driving result, so I go for rib eye instead of rump definitely. But I forgot how oily the rib eye originally is, not even mentioning the Marble 9 level fatty meat. As a person who normally can finish a 1.2kg rib eye by herself, this time I even didn’t finish this steak by 2 person sharing. Bc its unbelievably oily to have it, I literally felt I was nearly going to vomit…so I stopped eating it.

3, the entree and the dessert were all very normal or even bad. I honestly couldn’t understand why a place for people craving for steak has those shiiiiiiit.

I finished those 2 entree at all bc I was starving but actually I only want to eat steak.

‼️In conclusion, I think it was a very disappointed and undeserved trip to eat here on purpose, if u still want to come, please don’t order the M9 rib eye and feed urself a little bit...