Marks Restaurant - Lorne

We finally arrived & spent a gorgeous day in Lorne, the temp was about 30 degrees, we had a lovely long walk along the beach, a big swim for Michael, a half swim for me (I only went in to about my waist – the water was just a wee bit cold for me & I am a big wuss as everyone knows). We then had some relax time in our gorgeous Balinese style bungalow before heading out to dinner. I chose Marks on the main street, Mountjoy parade as had recently read good things about it in a gourmet traveller & also a food lovers guide to the Great Ocean Road. Luckily we booked in in the afternoon as we nearly didn’t get in, we did manage to nab a table at 8.30 though.

To start with I ordered the Tomato based local mussel & whiting soup, this was nice though I was expecting more of a tomato base with mussels in the shell & chunks of whiting with some bread to mop it all up. Was very surprised then when it came out as a puree, the flavours were all there & still nice though would much have preferred it to come out as imagined, you know what it is like when you picture something, if different it is usually a disappointment to some degree. I did however still get some delicious bread roll son the side to mop it all up as imagined. Michael ordered the Crispy local whitebait with saffron & chilly mayonnaise, as you can see form the photo the serving was huge, really nice flavours though could have been a bit more on the ‘crispy’ side. Our mains took quite a while to arrive, we even had to ask where they were at one stage, not a good sign especially as the steak I ordered was only supposed to be medium. Anyway the dishes finally arrived & my Chargrilled eye fillet steak was pretty good though on the more ‘well’ than ‘medium’ side of cooked. The fried polenta was excellent & have made a mental note to definitely learn how to cook this up myself soon, to finish it off the caramelised onion & red wine glaze was a perfect addition. On the side we had some steamed veges, serving was big & they came in the cutest little basket too. After the big night we were recovering from we skipped dessert, the long wait for the mains had put us to sleep so needed to get to bed in a hurry. All in all was a good meal in a lovely location.