SALTWATER Phillip Island — Restaurant in Victoria

DELICIOUS FOOD!

I just want to clarify this so that people don't think the food is no good based on my three star rating. Unfortunately the food is let down by the subpar service. My table was left utterly forgotten. Our meal took what I estimate to be upwards of an hour to arrive. Many other groups who came in after us were getting their food before us so I am pretty sure the staff made a mistake and didn't finish putting our order through the system. Ordinarily this would be fine. Accidents happen, I understand, but there was just no acknowledgement of it by a single member of staff. When you're hungry and surrounded by food you can't eat, you take a lot of offence from this.

There were a number of other issues stemming from the general incompetence of the staff. For example the food finally came out and not a single person waiting tables realised we hadn't yet been given cutlery or plates. We were watching some of the waiters for a while and it was just clear to us how they were missing tasks they could be doing all throughout the restaurant. I don't blame any of them. They've just been inadequately trained which is the fault of their boss. Anyway, I am a return customer, and will be back again next time I come down to Phillip Island because the food really is that good. It just loses quite a bit of its appeal when you're frustrated and hangry so if the aforementioned boss is reading this, please give your wait staff a little more training because your establishment deserves it.

Side note (what I'm about to say did not affect the rating and is just a little observation you likely don't want or need to pay attention to): I know this is probably from sheer coincidence given the lower level of racial diversity in Phillip Island as opposed to Melbourne, but I noticed that much of the staff in the kitchen are of East Asian descent but then virtually all the wait staff (who are the employees that customers actually SEE) are low-key...hyper-aryan. I know it's probably nothing but I just thought it was funny in a disconcerting sort of way and honestly just wanted to know if anyone else had...

This was an experience more categorized by how excruciatingly close to great it was! The detractions are admittedly 'nit-picky' but honestly they are also the only reason to not give five stars. I've seen issues over 'young staff' but I'd defend against the inference of inexperience here any day. The two we dealt with were friendly, helpful and professional. Kudos to them! The food was perfectly cooked. Amounts were great. And the decor was phenomenal, as was the view and the music! Which brings me to the annoyance. It was the little things that would have changed the meal from good to GREAT which essentially at it's core is seasonings and condiments. A lime wedge in a coke should be a request, not a garnish. It fundamentally changes the flavour. Porterhouse was excellently cooked, but gristle all through it. If you're charging a premium for steak, the cut needs to be worth it and honestly, the steak needed more salt and pepper. We had to ask for them, and as artisanal as crushed salt and cracked pepper is and how good it looks... in honesty, we needed table-grade ground to elevate the dish to taste as good as it looked. Pasta was made in-house (massive brownie points here) but was also plain and unseasoned. The dish wasn't strong enough to mask that. Desserts were made in-house as well (again, massive kudos here, because not enough places do this) but this was undercut by the missing component. Fresh cream wouldn't have taken away from the desserts but definitely would have elevated them to the supreme! The lemon meringue was beautiful but incredibly strong. Cream would have cut through that tartness and really made the dish perfect. Same with the chocolate mousse. It was incredibly rich, so rich that it was a struggle to finish it. The base was stale, which didn't help but honestly, again, cream would have helped perfectly finish the dish. I think the potential perfection of the entire meal is the let-down. So close to a 5...

Being a restaurateur with 30 years experience I am reluctant to criticize a restaurant preferring to just give them a miss however this was just remarkable

Had the family down for the day and thought we’d give Saltwater another try considering the debacle at our first visit wherein they lost our order – granted, on that occasion they did offer FOC but we paid saying we understand the teething problems of a new restaurant

On this occasion I rung the restaurant to find if they were open for lunch – yes, they were open and it was explained that between 3pm and 5pm they only served Tapas and Pizza - we all gave this a thumbs up and down we went – My wife and I arrived about 3.30, the rest of the family were whey laid at the playground, we placed our order explaining to the waiter the family would be arriving a little later

Family arrived – the waiter organized high chairs and we were all ready for a nice afternoon – the waiter returned, took the appropriate stance and instead of handing out menus informed the family that “sorry we don’t serve food between 3-5pm

We were all a bit gob smacked - checking to make sure it wasn’t April Fools Day I could only say “you’ve got to be kidding” – no sir! he replied The Chef had misinformed me – I said “but you have just taken our order, what’s going on” – Oh! your orders OK we just can’t do any more food between 3 and 5pm.

I asked to see the manager who duly arrived – I explained that we had rung prior to arriving and been told of the 3 to 5 business – further we had ordered food and drinks with no hint of no food and instead of sorting the problem he asked me to calm down – after more words they agreed to prepare the food

Don’t think I’ll risk a 3rd visit

Unfortunately they have the best site in town and the best equipment - unfortunately they don’t know what to do with it – for their sake I hope they learn...