Sunday in Daylesford and it was time for lunch at the Lake House.
The Lake House restaurant is part of the Lake House complex, which also includes accommodation and a day spa. It is in a beautiful setting over looking the lake, which has ducks and geese wandering about. The restaurant has two chef’s hats and numerous other awards. Executive chef is Alla Wolf-Tasker, and her husband Allan is responsible for most of the art work around the place, including the plates that are on the tables when you are first seated.
J and I have stayed at the Lake House a few years back and had enjoyed the food we had then and were both looking forward to seeing if it was still as good.
Today was Mum and Dad’s 40th wedding anniversary so more reason to have a nice lunch and celebrate.
When I rang and booked I could only get a 1pm booking. I thought this was because the restaurant was busy. But when we arrived there were only a few occupied tables, and the rest filled up after we arrived. I believe this was because there was a wedding reception being held in the function room and they wanted to get them all sorted before having regular dining guests descended on the restaurant. The wedding definitely had no effect on our meal or service. The wait staff were run off the feet but kept up with everyone and everything.
Dad spoke to the maître de and sent a message of best wishes to the bride and groom from someone who was celebrating his 40th wedding anniversary. I thought that was really sweet. 
We kicked off with a bottle of Louis Roderer champagne.
We received a plate of olives and thin crunchy bread sticks. I was the only olive fan on the table and they were good ones. The bread was very tasty but salty, I really liked it.
We also received a basket of freshly baked bread. Bread is baked twice daily in-house. Great bread, with the rolls being everyone’s favourite. We were offered a top-up later on in the meal but declined as we thought we would fill up on it!
Lake House offers a degustation menu or a set price for two, three or four courses.
J and I were the only ones to go for entrée. I was hoping Mum and Dad would help with mine, Dad did a bit and so did J. I had the Lake House Charcuterie and local salumi.
A beautifully presented platter consisting of duck rillette, country terrine, jellied smoked pork, duck liver parfait, two year old black Berkshire prosciutto, fennel and chilli sausage and pickles and seasonal garnishes. I didn’t go much on the duck rillette in the jar. But everything else was tasty and my favourite was the duck liver parfait.
J had the five tastes from the sea, which was, from left to right:
* Pipeclay Lagoon oyseter with nim jam
* Sea urchin custard
* Queensland mud crab, lemongrass kaffir lime
* Crystal Bay prawn in tempura with chilli aioli
* Tuna sashimi, pickled cucumber, Asian salad
He really enjoyed it, said it was all very good, especially the oyster.
For mains I had the pastured beef. It consisted of roast fillet, poached silverside, smoked tongue, oxtail agnolotti, horseradish, veal consommé and marrow butter brioche. The veal consommé and brioche were on a separate plate.
I had been tossing up between this dish and the rabbit pie, but I was glad of my decision as soon as I saw it. And I saw the pie come out on another table later and that reinforced my decision.
It was all very good, and I demolished the lot. The only thing I wasn’t sure about was having cold silverside on top of the hot agnolotti.
J had the 12 hour suckling pig, celeriac, sauce chutney, smokehouse riesling braised cabbage. He said was excellent, he would have just liked a bit more of it.
Mum and Dad both had the duck – spiced roast breast lightly smoked, walnut crumbed foie gras, glazed witlof, prune cigar and puffed grains. They both liked this dish but Dad doesn’t get why they had to serve it in cubes.
We also had a side of roasted potatoes and a plate of spiced pumpkin. Both very good, and neither lasted very long!
With our mains we had a bottle of Oakridge Lieu-dit Chardonnay – Mackay Vineyard.
We were all pretty full but had to have a look at the dessert menu.
I had the assorted chocolate textures, early violets. It was mousse, ice cream, white chocolate jelly and some early violet granita. A good chocolate dessert, but not great.
J and mum shared the dessert for two, which today was passionfruit flavours. They really enjoyed it.
Dad had the gingered pear, gingerbread, honeycomb, gingerbread ice cream. Another good dessert.
We had a half bottle of Kooyong Chardonnay with dessert.
Coffees were had by Dad and J and we were done.
An excellent meal, and a great way to finish our weekend. I highly recommend the Lake House.
The Lake House meal that we had was just wonderful too! Alla and her family and team do a fantastic job there