Lobster Cave Beaumaris - Motion In The Ocean

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Lobster Cave Beaumaris - Motion In The Ocean
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• South of Sandringham and Black Rock, you will
  find the sleepy suburb of Beaumaris with a simple
  shopping strip with the Lobster Cave a
  distinct architectural highlight, nestled in next
  door to a Pizza Capers franchise. Despite people
  raving about this place and both the quality and
  volume of seafood that is in offer, a visit
  elluded me until I was out driving around with
  someone else where I was the passenger. I was in
  the area picking up a snowboard and boots for the
  forthcoming snow season (please, let it snow!) so
  I offered to pick up the tab at the Lobster Cave
  knowing that I could get stuck into wine and not
  have to worry about driving home.

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• We were given a table outside under the bright
  and hot heat lamps. After exploring inside the
  restaurant, I was grateful that we were seated
  outside as it was calmer despite the footpath
  that separates the outdoor tables from
  the restaurant being used by random people.
  Service was quite welcoming, almost too
  welcoming, indicating they were singing from a
  hymn book.

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• Drinks orders were taken. I ordered a Hendricks
  Gin Tonic to start off things. A small bottle
  of  Bombay Sapphire, a small bottle of tonic and
  a glass of ice was brought out and the elements
  were all placed in front of me on a small tray.
  So I was tasked with making my drink. Weird. The
  same sort of odd service was wrapped around
  serving the sparking mineral water. Two empty
  glasses, two glasses of ice with tongs and two
  bottles of water were placed on the table.

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• I have never met anyone in my life that requires
  a certain variable of ice cubes in proportion to
  the volume of water so all I was seeing was a bit
  of extravagance just for the sake of it and far
  too many glasses on the table especially after I
  quickly knocked back the GT and ordered another
  one, this time articulating that I wanted
  Hendricks gin. The wine list was procured as was
  the food menu and it took some time to read about
  all of the options available.

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• We decided to order the "Ultimate" Combination
  Platter with Whole Rock Lobster (299.90 for two)
  and I requested a bottle of chardonnay from the
  Yarra (honestly, I can't remember what I ordered
  as I lost the scrap of paper I wrote it on) and
  when I quizzed service rather facetiously as
  whether there would be enough food, we were
  offered fries and a salad, to which we declined.
  About twenty minutes later, the bonanza of
  seafood was delivered. As expected, it was a
  massive amount of food.

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• There was one two level riser with two plates of
  assorted delights, a plate of fried seafood and a
  plate with the Rock Lobster, rice, bivalve
  mollusks and other assorted condiments. This was
  a table for two and after all of the food was
  delivered, there was absolutely no space left
  (note my comment about the exceptional amount of
  glassware earlier) which left some of the plates
  dangling precariously over the side as our eyes
  attempted to digest the task ahead of us.

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• Whole flame grilled Rock Lobster was apparently
  the star of this performance. At least given the
  name of the restaurant and the striking beauty of
  this crustacean which was cut in half so that we
  could easily pull the meat from the cavity. I
  really like lobster. I especially like it when it
  is pulled from the tank, slaughtered in front of
  me and the meat ends up on rice in a sushi bar
  within one minute of its death. I also like it
  boiled and steamed at Chinese restaurants. For
  some reason though, this grilled Rock Lobster did
  not do much for me. It seemed a bit dry and I did
  not want to disrespect its memory by dressing it
  with condiments. 

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• Whole seared cray tail infused with lemon,
  garlic, parsley olive oil and the Queensland
  (Mooloolaba) jumbo cooked tiger prawns were some
  of the highlights of this feast. The kitchen
  conveniently sliced the sharp exoskelton of the
  tiger prawns in the kitchen so it was convenient
  to remove the flesh.

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• Pacific oysters served three ways - crab meat and
  caviar, horseradish cream and smoked salmon with
  pearls and mornay bordered two of the large
  dishes. An interesting and tasty take on classic
  oysters and the horseradish cream was a nice
  touch especially since I was looking for
  something to excite my palate a bit.

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• Returning to the fried food which was quickly
  filling my stomach, the salt and pepper squid was
  another highlight and perhaps my favourite if you
  can believe it. The hot chilli steamed black
  mussels were served in a large bowl and they were
  all perfectly cooked in a mild sauce where I only
  came across one mussel that did not open during
  the cooking process. The grilled Kangaroo Island
  abalone was also filled with flavour and unlike
  the lobster, I enjoyed this mollusk grilled and
  it was probably the best abalone that I have ever
  had.

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• Refreshing the palate with watermelon and rock
  melon intermittently during this war on the
  seafood stocks, the whole grilled Moreton Bay
  bugs were devoured quickly and in between bites
  of fruit my share of Hervey Bay scallops on the
  half shell and the whole crumbed and fried soft
  shell crab was consumed. Wine was drank. The
  night being spent on the street of Beaumaris was
  turning into a festive occasion.

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• At this point we were looking at each other with
  consternation and agreed that we could not finish
  all of the food so tactical decisions had to be
  made. The Western Australian scampi, smoked
  Tasmanian salmon with caviar pearls and
  the tempura tiger prawns were polished off.
  Despite wok tossed blue swimmer crab being
  available, I found it too difficult to get any
  meat out of them and the quest for some of my
  favourite flesh from the sea was quickly
  abandoned.

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• We had to fully ignore the Thai style South
  Australian baby calamari salad and the beer
  battered King George whiting fillets. The latter
  mainly because these fillets were huge and we
  could not tolerate anything fried after some of
  the wonderful tastes of seafood available on
  these four huge plates.

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• Service was a mixed bag. One of the servers was
  amusing, pleasant and engaging. He was ultimately
  succonded to the wealth of diners inside as by
  the time our "Ultimate" platter was nearly
  polished off, there were but a handful of diners
  outside. I overheard another server be told to
  check on us every 15 minutes but that did not
  happen. Yet another member of service kept
  appearing asking if we wanted tea or coffee
  however I wanted more GT's and kept ordering
  them. The attack of the empty glasses started in
  again and by the time I had my dessert which
  consisted of a fourth GT after polishing off the
  bottle of wine, the table looked
  very unkempt with remains of seafood, rice,
  serviettes and empty glasses that the infrequent
  service did not really pay much attention to.

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• When the bill was requested, that was brought out
  quickly along with a fair amount of propaganda
  relating to the Lobster Cave "Gold Medallion
  Club" where we were advised that the one-time 99
  joining fee had been waved and that we should
  hand over all of our personal details so that we
  can join said secret society. The benefit would
  have been should we return, we would be entitled
  to a free bottle of wine to takeaway provided
  that we spend a certain amount of money. Like
  with Taco Bill, I am not a fan of these sorts of
  gimmicks so I couldn't be bothered signing up.

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• Given this is the Lobster Cave, I expected to see
  tanks of lobsters respectfully hidden within the
  walls inside the restaurant. There are tanks with
  tropical fish and an LED television on the wall
  with an "under the sea" screen saver, but I did
  not see any evidence of what was on offer and the
  seafood presumably rests behind the scenes
  somewhere.

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• Although the Lobster Cave is impressive and would
  make for a good venue to host a doo, I find it
  quite inconvenient to get to so it would be a
  challenge to end up there again under favourable
  circumstances.

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• To know more information please visit

http//www.epicureanofsouthbank.com