A taste of the West

Boasting a rich and vibrant food culture, Western Australia has emerged as a gourmet haven that is attracting visitors from across the country and across the world.

Story Diana Plater   Photography Daniel Grant

21 July, 2015


Embracing the Margaret River region

I’m sitting on a small sand hill overlooking the clear waters of Bunker Bay as I spot dolphins diving past fishing lines.

Suddenly something disturbs a flock of galahs foraging on the beach. They take off into the cloudless sky in a flurry of pink feathers and squawks, silhouetted against the bright blue of the sea.

It’s a typical autumn afternoon in the beautiful Margaret River region of the south west of Western Australia, famed for its wine and food and where winemakers and restauranteurs are just as likely to don a wet suit as a dinner suit.

We’ve driven down here in a new Audi TT, picking it up from valet parking at Perth Airport after an early morning Qantas flight. We’re refreshed despite the crack-of-dawn start, luxuriating in the newly upgraded Airbus A330’s Business Class fully-flat beds.

Our plan is to see some of the scenery, wineries, providores and other highlights of the Margaret River area – an easy three-hour drive from Perth (especially with the TT’s virtual cockpit guiding the way) – then return to the Swan Valley in the west of the city to do some more imbibing and feasting, with a squiz at the massive changes that are happening in the state capital, in particular its growing bar scene.

But you can’t race all the way there without a stop for lunch at The Goose, right next to the 150-year-old Busselton Jetty on Geographe Bay – at 1.8km, the longest timber-piled jetty in the Southern Hemisphere.

As kids jump into the sea from atop railings, we speak to an old timer, who has been coming down here almost every day of his 82 years to fish and enjoy the vast horizon, sometimes piling his catch back onto the jetty train on its journey back from the Underwater Observatory.

West Australian Gold Band Snapper with Carnarvon asparagus, roasted cherry truss tomatoes and fennel, and white wine cream – is my dinner choice at the Other Side of the Moon, at the Bunker Bay Pullman Resort, where we are to stay two nights. Like all the restaurants we eat at it showcases a winning combination of fresh, local food matched with Margaret River wines.

A Mediterranean climate

The region’s combination of a Mediterranean climate, maritime influence and perfect soils has produced spectacular wines, in particular Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay.  

But it was the ‘world-class surf breaks’, made famous by the surfing championships that first drew executive chef Aaron Carr here around 20 years ago, even if the food and work made him stay at Vasse Felix, Margaret River’s founding wine estate, established by Dr Thomas Cullity in 1967.

We could easily also become ensconced as we sit outside the Wine Lounge, overlooking Wilyabrup Brook and some of those premium Cabernet vines while nibbling on charcuterie including duck ham house cured with orange peel then lightly smoked, matched with the 2013 Vasse Felix Chardonnay. The winery also has a gallery featuring a seasonal program of exhibitions from the Holmes a Court collection. 

We’re swaying a bit from side to side (but of course not driving!) as just down the road at Cullen Wines in Wilyabrup we are treated to an impromptu lecture on Biodynamics by gardener  Jaimie Orkin, who explains the winery was certified A Grade Biodynamic in 2004 by the Biological Farmers Association (BFA) of Australia – a philosophy and method of farming devised by Rudolf Steiner that treats the vineyard as a living system.

Orkin shows us cow horns, giving us a whiff of the manure that fills them, ready to be buried underground in winter. The aim is to help the soil develop humus, attract earthworms and micro-organisms. We test the theory out during a wine tasting then lunch with all the vegetables straight out of the garden including the broad beans for my falafels. The winery passes the test with flying colours. 

Tastes and experiences

But there’s more to this area than food, wine and craft beer (try the Eagle Bay Brewing Co.) with lots of fascinating cottage industries including Vasse Virgin. When the children of owners Louis and Edwina Scherini were diagnosed with eczema, the couple experimented in their kitchen, inspiring their range of soaps, hand creams and moisturising lotions made with extra virgin olive oil.

Just when I think I can’t take any more fresh air and ocean, we’re having breakfast overlooking the sea, forest and vines at Wise Wine at Eagle Bay when owner Heath Townsend arrives with a 20kg Jew fish, freshly caught by his local suppliers.

“It’s a great lifestyle here, to be able to go for a surf with your kids,” he says.

Ah that mention of surfing again, as we are about to head north and a little inland to the Swan Valley, the earliest wine-growing area of Western Australia.

Mandoon Estate, which also has a restaurant and microbrewery, dates back to the 1840s when WA’s first Surveyor General John Septimus Roe built his homestead on the Swan River surrounded by grape vines. 

Just opposite is the Sandalford Estate, which shares this heritage and is also a popular spot for tourists and concert-goers. Senior winemaker Hope Metcalf tells us that when Pink sang here, she announced her favourite wine was of course the Margaret River Range Rose. Tasting it under the century-old vines where we have lunch I might just have to agree with her.  But the history goes back way further – at the Yonga Boodjah Aboriginal Art Gallery, Indigenous artist Phil Narkle tells us this is the country of the Wadjuk people, who ‘helped clear the land’ for grapes and agriculture. He remembers that as a child in the 1950s and ’60s he would come up here with his family, to pick currants for contractors.    

We stop at the Yagan Memorial Park, which commemorates the life, death and spirit of the Nyoongar leader and warrior – just around the corner from where we are staying at the Novotel Vines Resort and Country Club. 

Yagan Square is the name of a proposed major new public space within the Horseshoe Bridge in Perth, on top of the buried railway. The Perth City Link project will unite the traditional night life area of Northbridge and the centre of the city.

Scott Taylor, owner of The Trustee Bar and Bistro in the former WA Trustees building on St Georges Terrace, told us at dinner he welcomes the changes to the state’s former ‘draconian’ licensing laws, which has allowed a plethora of new bars to open, some of which we checked out during a walking tour known as Two Feet and a Heart Beat.

Massive, colourful murals on once-grey buildings illustrate the emerging positive attitude towards arts and culture way out west.

Geographically distant from the rest of the country it may seem, the west boasts its own rich heritage and distinctive vibe that makes the trip across the continent worth the effort. And the Margaret River region just has to be seen – and tasted – to be believed.