Down on the Mornington Peninsula, in what was once the homestead to a cattle stud, husband and wife team Rowan and Janine Herrald have opened a dining room that is bringing people down from Melbourne.
The Herralds worked together at The Royal Mail in Dunkeld under chef Dan Hunter where they met front of house manager Clinton Trevisi. The trio opened the restaurant late last year, renovating the 1930s building they share with Dromana Estate’s cellar door.
A strong sense of seasonal cooking guides the savoury menu Rowan continually tweaks to reflect what is ready for harvest in the vegie patch he looks out over from his kitchen window. His spring cassoulet is a fresh and light play on the classic French dish. He starts with soaked white beans cooked in the oven at 140C in water with chopped carrots and celery for five hours. Creamy and intact, they are mixed with a sauté of finely diced shallots, carrot, fennel and garlic cooked with chorizo for extra body and a smoky tang. Blanched peas and broadbeans are stirred through the dish. This is topped with fried breadcrumbs and squid ink to replicate the crusty top that forms on a cassoulet. The fish element changes with market availability. It could be pan-roasted blue eye fillet (pictured) or calamari cooked sous-vide.
Janine is a dedicated pastry chef. Dessert is all she does. Portland-born of North Italian parents she was working with microsurgeons until at the age of 39 she decided her true calling was patisserie.
‘I was lumped in with 17-year-olds at William Angliss where I did my apprenticeship,’ she says with a laugh. Her Hot Plate is a sweet and sharp lemon meringue ‘tart’, an intensely lemon-tasting baked crème anglaise resting on a short sablé biscuit base. Alone this would be ironic or retro, but the addition of vanilla marshmallows, small meringues, white chocolate ‘soil’, a dehydrated crystalised sliver of fennel and flowers from the garden complete the gastronomic picture.
It is the attention to detail and finessing of these dishes, (and their menu comrades), that makes Terre a serious contender in the regional dining scene. This is beautifully counterbalanced by a sense of groundedness that comes not only from the chefs’ relationship with the garden but from Terre’s casual dining room and Clinton Trevisi’s understated but attentive service.
Open Wed-Sun noon-3pm, Fri-Sat 6pm-10.30pm
Terre, The Tuerong Homestead, Dromana Estate,
555 Old Moorooduc Road, Tuerong
Tel 03 5974 3155
www.terre.com.au
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