The aroma of beef cooking over the grill fills the dining room. There’s a pleasant mix of conversation, clinking of glass and clatter of plates and knives. This is Squire’s Loft Mornington, part of the collection of steak restaurants dotted around Melbourne and further afield. The Peninsula’s iteration of this meaty franchise in Main St, however, stands out from other venues.
Owners Siller and Deborah Bello reopened Squire’s Loft Mornington in February 2020. “We bought the restaurant because we loved the food and we loved coming here,” says the Peninsula pair. “We wanted to bring a premium dining experience to the heart of Mornington,” adds Siller. “We wanted to serve excellent but accessible food in a beautiful dining room. We wanted a place we would want to eat at.”
The décor and appointments are impressive. The long room is warm, softly lit, one wall lined with a padded banquette, the other side dotted with American-style circular booths. “We went to New York to check out places like Peter Luger Steak House in New York to benchmark the steak experience,” says Siller. Good glassware and Brazilian-made steak knives sit ready on the polished Tasmanian oak tables standing on warm terracotta tiles. The comfortable padded Australian ash chairs are made by Siller’s furniture company and have a pleasing heft. The bar gantry is lined with premium spirits and the wine wall proudly stocked with wines from the Mornington Peninsula. With all the wood, leather look, brass and copper the room has an overall welcoming, masculine feel.
The wine offer of top Mornington Peninsula wines is complemented by a range of Bordeaux, Burgundy, wines from Rhone, Sicily, Spain and South America. The adoption of a Coravin system that injects inert gas into the wine bottle allows these fine wines to be poured by the glass. A chance for meat-lovers to enjoy a glass of exceptional wine without forking out for a bottle.
The money shot here is the meat. Squire’s Loft prides itself on the quality of its steak, much of which is sourced from the Western District, across all its venues. At Mornington, Siller and Deborah have added another level of super-premium steaks to the Chairman’s Steak Selection. This includes 200 days grain-fed Rangers Valley Black Onyx Angus 700g ribeye and 500 days marble score 5 Rangers Valley Infinite Wagyu. These are cooked on a state-of-the-art gas grill that can reach 400C, searing steaks with perfect bar marks and a juicy, flavoursome interior. Add to this chicken, prawns, calamari, sausages and gourmet burgers and you’ll find a dish to keep every person at the table happy.
RICHARD CORNISH
Richard Cornish is a freelance food writer filing regular food news stories for newspapers and magazines across Australia, including Eat.Drink Mornington Peninsula and each month in Mornington Peninsula Magazine.
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