Courthouse Hotel — Restaurant in Victoria

Greeted by Jo during the day (for a sneaky pint) we booked in our meal for the night.

Welcome and service. On arrival we were greeted by Jo (again) and Kim (hilarious mask by the way) with some great country hospitality who got us signed in, to our booth and then had a laugh.

The place: a beautiful pub from the 1800’s you’d find in this area. With bar and bistro set up (make sure you book as it’s popular with the locals and the strays like us alike). Extremely clean environment and facilities, comfortable seats and even some friendly locals who greet you with a big G’day when you walk in.

Food: the extensive menu has every staple pub meal (parmigiana, pies, fish and chips and calamari) but the difference here is it’s all homemade and you’ll know what I mean when you eat here. We ordered the gnocchi, fettuccine and chicken, the kids chicken nuggets and I had the pie. To be honest we couldn’t fault a thing, just wonderful homemade, hearty and flavourful dishes. As corny as it sounds you can taste the love in every dish. Price wise the meals are below standard pub prices but the flavour certainly exceeds standards pubs.

Overall: from chatting with Jo and Kim, through to the feel of the old pub environment and the beautiful culinary experience we can’t wait to go back. Make sure you try here next you’re in Ballarat or the region as it’s only 10 mins out of the major centre and most definitely worth the short drive.

To Jo and the team, you’ve just jumped into our top three pubs. See you...

Ate here on the weekend; I thought it would be busier, but that's OK. Wait staff couldn't have been nicer, they managed all our queries and requests with a smile.

Only, it seems to be a bit challenged atm, or maybe it's just downsizing for the winter? The girls behind the bar apologised for the fewer choices of wine, and that there were quite a few items crossed off the menu.

But the wine we got was good and the much-reduced range of bottled beers was OK because they did have one I like. So that was fine.

The menu is so long it's confusing. They could cut the range (of meat-based meals) in half; they were so similar and the quality of any kitchen has got to suffer when there's too much choice. Could change the menu every month or so if they wanted to stay fresh-feeling, but they'd get things into a manageable focus that way. As is often the case with pubs, the vegetarian choices were few, protein-free and predictible... sigh. Never mind I was there for the company :)

The food we got was OK: the lamb thing, the meat pie, and the vegie pizza (the vegie pie was off, darn). I didn't like to ask if the pizza cheese was vegetarian...

Things got uncomfortable when the owner (manager?) showed up and started nagging the wait staff, though.The staff were doing a good job but he even started telling us about how rubbish they were when we were paying the bill. I didn't like...

I’m not a bit worried am a real person giving a genuine review Booked a table for 6 to celebrate a birthday Drinks order taken and received promptly When we ordered our meals… Sorry we have no pork in the kitchen tonight… Ok, can we have….. Sorry we have no lamb in the kitchen tonight… Oh okay…. No sorry we don’t have those 2 steaks but the others are available…. Good, thanks She then returned and said sorry we no longer have any beef…… So only chicken and frozen fish and of course vegetarian …… Ok 3 x chicken pies and 3 x pizzas ordered with 2 sides 60 minutes later when food arrived pizzas were not cooked and the toppings were not what was stated on the menu 1 of the sides sweet potato chips(which come in a bag) were unavailable, sorry we have no sweet potato chips We have been there often since its refurbish and the last 4 times we thought they must be having an off night, we will keep supporting our local hotel, no more it was the worst meal we have ever had. We will not return until new owners/managers or staff. It’s sad to see it go down hill...