Appellation

Appellation ought more rightly be called Acclamation. In the months before we finally decided to go we were constantly reading accolades in the press to this Barossa fine dining restaurant. One (usually hard to please) Adelaide critic gave it an unheard of 18/20 in his Advertiser review. We read much about the market garden on site and the fabulous cellar and decided that we really had to make the trip to find out what all the fuss was about.

We were excited to find that in this month the restaurant was featuring an Italian and Spanish Inspired Wine Flight Menu. Not knowing much about Spanish or Italian wines, but having loved some of those we had tasted, we were keen to explore further and taste some very special wines indeed. Unfortunately the clue was in the word "inspired". The Spanish and Italian varietals in question were all made by local (mostly Barossa) producers. In many cases the experiments with growing new varieties in a different country had led to disappointing results. We only really liked one of the wines on the list which made it a disappointing evening from the wine point of view.

From the food point of view things were better. The dish that will forever stay in my mind was an amuse bouche of fritters of anchovy and fresh sage - covered in a tempura batter and flash fried. We adore anchovies anyway, but packaged like this they were sublime.

The other hit of the menu was the pan fried fillet of Murray Cod with sweet and sour eggplant. The fish was perfectly cooked and contrasted beautifully with the eggplant. My partner commented that it was absolutely the best fish dish he had ever tasted. If only a great wine had gone with it we would have been very happy indeed.

We also enjoyed the Pork and rosemary sausages served with refried beans and blackberries. The sausages were wonderfully coarse and tasty and they were matched with the wine we most enjoyed, a Tscharke 2007 Tempranillo Graciano.

The service was excellent and the Happy Birthday added to our tasty petit fours was a nice touch. However on the whole the wines let down an otherwise excellent meal. We would much rather have had some matched wines from their award winning cellar than these experiments in varietals that grow well in other countries.