Stanley Bridge Tavern — Restaurant in Verdun

Well, I've, eventually, visited this wonderful establishment for a weekend lunch with friends. It's taken some time as I've always rang on the day for a booking. So here's the big tip, book EARLY! Like a week ahead. Maybe, you'll get lucky. There's a reason the carpark is always full. This place has exquisite food and service. Meals are cooked to perfection with relatively minimal waiting times for the plates to arrive. All meals arrive at the table at the same time or very, very close. Considering the packed venue it is inside and out this is close to miracle status. Nothing is too much trouble for the excellent staff and nothing forgotten. 10/10 Table is cleared quite quickly when meals are finished, another big tick from me. Main meals today for us were 2 x Pork Belly, 1x Baramundi and 1 x Nochi. Deserts 2 x Creme Brulai, 1 x Tirimasu 1 x Bread & Butter Pudding. We did start with garlic bread. Normally, your going to get something not quite to taste or so so. 🤔 However, every single item was absolutely perfect!! This place shoots down top class restaurants in one fell swoop. Meal sizes are not huge things you can't get through but if your a big eater there are other selections. Pricing is not particularly over the top and didn't strike me as expensive considering the quality. All the above plus 1x bottle of wine, 1x pint craft beer, 1x Corona, 2x cokes and 3x coffee's = $320 rounded up. On ANZAC Day where I assume the usual public holiday surcharge applies. I've paid more for less elsewhere. Seriously, this place is at the top it's game and worthy of your patronage. A bucket list pub. Very highly...

Off to a bad start as the person showing us to a range really didn't make us feel welcome or valued. Customer experience is key. We also noticed that he was specifically not letting people sit at the tables they were requesting. This included a table previously offered to us, so not booked, and 2 minutes later sat another walkin at that table. Not sure what his issue was, but didn't get a good vibe from him at all which was a shame as all the other staff seemed esky nice and like they were really trying to help.

More care needs to be taken with changes to orders. We have life threatening allergies, want to raise awareness of this and lack of menu options to accommodate. We were very appreciative that the waiter compensated for mistakes made with the food order by deducting from the overall bill. The waiter did their best to rectify and that was also appreciated and goes a long way. Thank you.

We will go back, but will probably turn around and leave if the seating guy is off next time now that...

Beautiful pub with great atmosphere and staff. My/our disappointment was with the food. For starters had olives, which would have been nicer warmed. Sourdough bread with butter straight out of the fridge thus making it impossible to spread. Both of us had beef schnitzel, mine with pepper gravy. From the moment it was placed in front of us there was a smell that indicated what I was about to eat was not going to be a pleasant experience. It was not enjoyable. The crumbs were were way to thick making it very hard to cut. For possibly the first time in my life I actually sent back a plate, at the end of the meal, with food left on it as did my partner. Could not eat it.

On a plus side I had from the specials board Bread and Butter pudding for desert. It was very nice but did not taste like bread and butter pudding - but as I said , it was lovely.

The coffee and wine were also very nice.

I would certainly go to this establishment again but in the hope my food experiences were...