For our last dinner in Australia went to De’sendent, one of the few fine dining restaurants in the Margaret River area that is open for dinner, as most of the fine dining is at winery restaurants and only open for lunch. There is no à la carte, only a six course tasting menu (AU$ 180). We opted for the local wine pairing ($90); there is also a ‘discovery’ wine pairing that also includes wines from elsewhere ($110).

We started with a 2023 Semillon from Margaret River, a natural wine made with some skin contact and luckily not the funky type of natural wine.

This was a surprisingly good pairing for the first set of snacks. The wine was quite textural and I feared it could clash with the more creamy aspects of the snacks, but in fact they improved the texture and brought out the aromas of the wine. The first snack was a golden kelp crisp with carrot tartare and a hazelnut emulsion. The second a pumpkin tartlet with smoked yogurt, and the third a bread crisp with taramasalata (salted and cured salmon roe), crème fraîche, and fresh herbs. The herbs were referred to as gremolata, but as there was no lemon zest or garlic, it should not be called that. A very elegant set of snacks.

The second and third set of snacks were both paired with the same sparkling wine from Great Southern, 47% Chardonnay, 43% Pinot Noir, and 10% Pinot Meunier, traditional method with 30 months on the lees. A mineral style with hints of apple. A good sparkling wine like this pairs with almost anything, so it was nice but also a bit lazy to pair it with two courses.

The second set of snacks consisted of an oyster with olive oil and apple, a deep fried scallop with black garlic foam, and a prawn salad on charcoal brioche with sweetcorn puree. I especially liked the prawn salad.

The third and final set of snacks was sourdough bread with egg white garum butter (quite salty), a Japanese custard (chawanmushi) with trout roe, and a dhufish ceviche with leaf oil and beetroot. I thought it was more like a dhufish tartare than a ceviche, as the fish did not appear ‘cooked’ and I did not taste any acid. The fish was also a bit chewy.

The next wine was a 2021 Chardonnay from Margaret River, aged for 9 months in French oak with stirring of the lees. The oak was quite prominent in this wine, as was the acidity, as no malo had been used. I think it is unfortunate that it is a ‘trend’ in Margaret River to skip the malo completely, as most of the wines could benefit from partial malo to get more pleasant acidity.

This was a good pairing for the dhufish with a butter sauce flavored with highly concentred stock of fish bones, with young scallions, and some caviar on top. The young scallions from the restaurant’s garden were nicely sweet and a nice contrast with the caviar. The fish could have been cooked slightly less, but otherwise a very nice dish.

The red wine was a 100% Petit Verdot from Margaret River. In Bordeaux this grape variety is only used as a small percentage in a blend and it doesn’t get ripe enough (or at least it didn’t use to before climate change) to make a 100% PV. But here it makes for a nice fresh wine, although the alcohol is a bit high (15.2%).

It was a good pairing for the Margaret Rivery wagyu beef with potato puree, corn, and spinach. The beef had been glazed with a tare (Japanese glaze) made by the restaurant from abalone. When eating everything together, the beef was drowned out a bit by the other stuff on the plate. But itself, the flavor of the beef with the glaze was very nice and by alternating bites the dish ‘worked’ very well. The wagyu was not as tender as other wagyu beef we’ve had in this area.

The palate cleanser was a peach and yuzu sorbet.

The dessert wine was a fortified Shiraz from Margaret River. Nice and sweet with cherry aromas.

It was a pretty good pairing for the macadamia ice cream with crumbs, and peach. The dessert was very nice, with good contrasts between the creamy ice cream, the crunchy crumbs, and the fresh peach. I think a white dessert wine could have worked better (because of the peach) or a ‘tawny’ style red dessert wine (because of the nuts), but the pairing did work.

We had a very nice dinner at De’sendent. The food was creative and beautifully presented. The level of the wines was slightly below the level of the food, which is probably fine for most people, but as a wine lover I would not have minded paying a bit more for nicer wines. Put in another way, the food was at the same level as the food at the wineries we’ve been to, but at the wineries the wines were better. Which makes sense, I suppose.