Rolling out of Table 78 - Tempura Prawns, Pork Belly, Pannacotta…

We were taken to Table 78 in West Perth for lunch yesterday. It’s a charming restaurant with character and the service was wonderful as was the food.

To start we had the olive oil, crisp bread with dips to share:

• Roast beetroot & feta zucchini
• Mint & garlic eggplant
• Tomato & olive

The dips were different and the plate looked visually appealing but I would have preferred home-made foccacia bread (other starter on the menu) rather than crisps.

We also ordered a dozen of tempura oysters which was served with pickled cucumber and chilli jam.

I don’t eat natural oysters so the choices for cooked oysters are usually Kilpatrick or Kilpatrick. So I was super impressed when I saw tempura oysters on the menu and even more impressed when I had a taste. The tempura was very light as it should be, not at all oily and the contrasting tastes of the slightly ‘sour’ pickled cucumber and ‘sweet’ chilli jam went really well with the ‘savoury’ tempura oysters.

When it came to deciding what to have for my main, there was no competition - the pork belly with potato puree, truffle green beans, roast shallots and gremolata was a clear winner.

I’m all for portions…and this piece of pork belly was a very decent size, the potato puree was deliciously creamy and the truffle green beans were tasty. The pork belly itself had a crispy skin - I don’t normally eat the skin so not sure what came over me yesterday but it wasn’t oily at all and tasted really good!

A couple of the guys had the fresh angel hair pasta with blue swimmer crab meat, spring onion, garlic, green chilli and rocket which they described as “light and tasty with just enough crab & pasta”.

I heard the linguini with chilli prawns, zucchini, green olives, garlic & toasted breadcrumbs was nice too. The prawns were nicely marinated and of a decent size.

My colleague Clayts had ordered a medium rare steak yesterday at the C Restaurant but it had arrived bleeding so Table 78 just had to cook their steak right to win him over

And Table 78 did win him over…according to him the steak was “much better than the C Restaurant, expertly cooked medium rare, fries light but welcome addition - flavoursome and not too oily”.

So by this point with half a bottle of Stella Bella SB in me, I really shouldn’t have said yes to dessert but as always pannacotta on the menu convinces my tummy I have room for dessert and as I had been up since 4:40am that morning I thought I’d better also have a latte to give me that afternoon kick.

The pannacotta was topped with passionfruit jelly and orange granita. The pannacotta itself was good - nice and creamy & sweet. But the orange granita was a bit too sour for my liking (don’t think the passionfruit jelly was sweet enough to offset the sourness of the granita) and melted all through my pannacotta which made my dessert very watery and sour. I was tempted to pour the melted granita out but didn’t think it was great etiquette so I had my pannacotta really quickly with sips of my latte in between to offset the sourness.

I didn’t have dessert envy at all because I was so full and shouldn’t have really had the pannacotta, but the chocolate hazelnut semi freddo, flourless chocolate cake and chocolate mousse looked amazing…

I really should have had just the two scoops of vanilla bean ice-cream with the biscotti…would have made walking back into the city from West Perth alot ‘lighter’.

Table 78 was a cool place to go for a work lunch, food was great and service was perfect. Starters are from $7 - $36, mains are from $24 - $38 and dessert around $7 - $15. I do like the West Perth area and plan to explore more restaurants and bars - let me know what other West Perth gems are hiding