Country Eating

My family is from Gippsland and so I go down there fairly often. Drouin is a little place with a few nice cafes dotted about, and nearby is Warragul (the South Yarra to Drouin's Fairfield) and Neerim South and Jindavick with their own little versions of fancy. Now, there is some really nice food around this area, especially given that there is obviously a smaller market and less competition, and probably quite a few fewer people who want to eat in cafes on a regular basis (can I say that? I am basing this on my experiences of visiting two people over 60). But there are also a bunch of restaurants that I like to call glamtry. You know glamping? When people who are not really into camping attempt to joosh up the experience by adding a lot of expensive and unnecessary elements to the mix to avoid feeling like they're really camping? And yet they miss the point of camping, after all? This is what it's like at a few shall-remain-nameless establishments in country Victoria, which, determined to prove (to themselves? To their partner in the business? Presumably they are not focused on the customer) that they are just as hip as their city cousins, and CHOSE to move to the country, dahling, make their dishes replete with inappropriate and ineffectively done trimmings and cooking styles that ultimately make the food taste a bit crapper than it should. This is often accompanied by bad service, of the kind that seems to be primarily focused on illustrating the superiority in manners and habits of said owner/manager/swanner-about-the-place-type. This the the domain of those who would glamourise the country.

Case in point: my husband and I went to a reasonably well known restaurant in Jindavick that I'd enjoyed a number of years before. They have a beautiful property and the place seemed pleasant enough in my brief visit a few years earlier. The same guy was still running the place. But now, with attitude. Firstly, on a Sunday afternoon in JINDAVICK (oh that anyone had heard of this place and could understand how middle-of-nowhere it is) we went out there for coffee but, in spite of there being many empty rooms and tables, were asked to sit at the bar. Presumably to remind us of how lowbrow we were being, to want coffee instead of a meal, this is a time honoured technique of the glamtry business. They may have beautiful rooms and service, but it is not for the likes of you. (Unfortunately for them, we were there to check it out for our wedding. We got married in Melbourne at the Italian, which was lovely and very professional. But that's for another day). Having been plonked at the bar, we ordered our coffees: a long mac for me and a latte for my husband/fiance. The waitress, who was also making our coffee, didn't know what a long mac was. No problem-- we are about two hours from Melbourne and at least 25 minutes from any other coffee shops. Long macs tend not to get a lot of press in Drouin, let alone Jindavick. What was less appealing was when the owner came out and growled, in front of us, at the poor waitress, about what a long mac was. Which was described as a glass of foam with a little dollop of coffee on the top.

Ouch. So as I waited for my inverted long mac and squirmed at the thought of all the other customers in this poor woman's life who would be confused by their serving of milk with a drop of coffee, I was even more surprised to hear that the cake which we ordered to take away was going to be a problem. There were no cake trays. Our coffee came out-- sans serviette, in a hot glass. Eventually we did get a napkin-- our take away cake was wrapped in it.

All this might be quite acceptable-- charming even, if it wasn't for the owner's prancing about deeming us too peasant-like for his chairs and his waitress too ignorant for belief.

This is not the first time I've been patronised by restaurant staff who confuse preening and affectations of superiority with service. But it's probably one of the worst combinations of terrible service and sneering condescension I'd seen in a while!

Country restaurants, I say to you. Please do food and service well and accept that the presence of semi-dried tomatoes in your sandwiches does not place you at the cutting edge of gastronomy. Nor does it matter, if you are polite and cook nicely.