Vat 2 — Restaurant in Western Australia

Maybe the stars of the restaurant were given to the beach front view. Arrived at 1130 and was told that lunch would be served starting from 12noon. We were thinking that’s fine, we could order some drinks first. At 12 something, we ordered a hiramasa kingfish, crispy lemon chicken and duck ravioli. Kingfish was marinated, the taste of the sauce was too powerful, couldn’t really taste the fish itself; Crispy chicken - loads of unseasoned fried rice paper strips (not even crispy) at the bottom, the chicken was nicely seasoned, but the portion was poorly small, 4 of us only had one bite each; Duck ravioli - white sauce, cherry tomato, small pieces of broccoli. White sauce - which is cream/milk/cheese, should have the hint of sweetness from diary products, but it tasted sour🥲, not the spoiled sour, they might have paired the white sauce with vinegar or lemon juice; had never eaten any broccoli that was so fibrous, each piece of broccoli was prickly fibrous 😭😭😭😭

The bill ended up $110 with 2 alcoholic drinks

Service was damn poor - waved at them multiple times and literally talked to the waitress and waiters that we wanted to order food - no one gave damn attention to us. Waited for 15mins for someone to come over and another 30 mins for the food to arrive.

At last for the future customers - please stick with the chips and...

Whilst driving to Margaret River, with time to spare we decided on a quick lunch in Bunbury. Where to go? I recall the original Vat in Margaret River was wonderful years ago so I thought lets give Vat 2 a try. Good move. Fairly quiet at midday on Friday we had a nice indoor table overcooking the water. A fairly extensive menu looked appetising and I went for the oysters which were excellent followed by the Whiting Tempura. My partner had the special seafood chowder. I dont exaggerate when I say the Tempura is one of the best dishes I have eaten for a long time. Superb fish (and a generous 4 pieces) in a fantastic light batter sitting on top a delicious slaw with Vietnamese style dressing. THIS IS A SERIOUSLY FANTASTIC DISH. Mind blowing. My partner enjoyed her chowder with the only suggestion that the seafood bits are cut a little smaller as they are hot and on the large side to consume in one bite. We are heading back to Perth tomorrow and I think another visit is on the cards.

Vat lives on indeed. Keep up the good work. Bunbury you are very lucky to have...

This was our Christmas lunch for a group of 10 and we chose this restaurant because our last experience was good. This time it was a disaster. We were seated at a table that was only half set and we had to ask for more cutlery and serviettes then waited for more than an hour before they took a drinks order from us. Then another long wait before someone came to take our order. In total it was two hours before the meal arrived and it wasn't even busy. There were a good number of front-of-house staff milling around the bar, so it was not understaffed in that area but the table behind us lay uncleared for the entirety of our meal. The order included two seafood platters ($180ea) that were bulked up with bread and garnishes and some of it was so undercooked that it wasn't edible. The steaks were acceptable but of the two fish dishes, the Coral trout (fish of the day) was so dry that it also was inedible and the whiting was tasteless and bland and the chips cold and soggy ($59). This was not what I expected from a restaurant of...