The oddest thing about dinner was that the service was non-existent. Literally. There were no waiters.
Mid-afternoon, we had checked in to suite 12, a grand-proportioned, high-ceilinged pair of rooms heavy with gold brocade drapes, thick carpeting and massive brass bedsteads. French doors in high arched windows led to a rear timber verandah with scattered wicker furniture, outdoor potplants and a couple of those old polished aluminium smoking tables that have a bracket for your cigarettes and a tray for the ash. And plenty of room for your drink.
Later in the afternoon, the busy manager knocked on the door and dropped in a paper menu for the dining room. 'We're short on service tonight, so you might want to order early,' she said kindly. 'I'll make sure it's ready at the time you want to eat. Everything's on except the pork belly,' she added helpfully, with a smile; before rushing off again.
So we put in our dinner orders early. Fish for Tracy; filet mignon for me. Rare, thank you.
Six o'clock ticked around and found us sitting in the lobby, on the far side, in front of the hearth, on a comfortable old red-brown chesterfield with several buttons missing. It was the kind of chair you could spend winter in. Someone had moved half of the stacked lumber into the fireplace and lit it; and the heat was enough to melt several polar ice-caps, which was good, because as I pointed out earlier, it was going to be a cold night.
I had a drink in one hand and a baby in the other and so did Tracy. Life is a compromise with children, although which hand the compromise was in I couldn't decide.
I finished my drink and then I finished Tracy's and then we moved into the dining room. It was good that it was otherwise vacant, because you never know what babies are going to do. William and Thomas were scrubbed and buffed and polished and brushed and they had their best pyjamas on and they were already fed and Thomas might have fallen asleep in the pram and William might have played nicely with his model car or sat quietly in a high-chair; but then again they might both have screamed the house down.
The dining room had two massive pillars in the middle and gilt mirrors around the walls and more acres of carpet on the floor and all the tables were done up to the nines with starched linen and crystal and full six-piece cutlery place settings. It's been so long since I've seen six-piece cutlery place settings I've forgotten what pieces four through six are for.
Total silence in such a grand place is weird yet kind of fun; as if you are waiting expectantly for someone to clang a knife or drop a glass. But nobody did. All we could hear were distant but familiar kitchen noises: the hiss of food hitting hotplate, the chop-chop-chop of sharp knives and the muffled banter of kitchen staff. Soon, dinner came out, presented shyly by a kid who was obviously an apprentice chef. Tracy's wild barramundi was fresh and better than we've eaten a lot closer to where they swim, so someone is doing something right. My filet was perfectly rare, not just slightly pink in the middle as is so often the case when 'rare' is requested. On the side were slender boiled carrots and beans, cooked properly, not merely blanched so that you have to crunch them up like rabbits. I like my vegetables cooked, thank you. There was another accompaniment on each plate, a kind of 1950s flying saucer of which the rims were thick, circular chips of sweet potato and the middle bulge a kind of mushroom and blue cheese mixture. This place knew exactly what I like. Rare steak, cooked vegetables, blue cheese and UFOs. And all without a waiter.
We sat some more on the chesterfield afterwards and finished our wine, a magnificent Rutherglen red that you could have stood a spoon up in. The flames in the fireplace had died down to a mere bonfire and we watched them crackle and spurt for a while and then we retired for the night. The brass bedstead was about four feet off the ground and had about fifty blankets on it and it was like sleeping over at grandma's.
*
By the way, here's what the Leeton Hydro Hotel looked like in 1936. Notice, no Volvo wagons parked out front.
Mid-afternoon, we had checked in to suite 12, a grand-proportioned, high-ceilinged pair of rooms heavy with gold brocade drapes, thick carpeting and massive brass bedsteads. French doors in high arched windows led to a rear timber verandah with scattered wicker furniture, outdoor potplants and a couple of those old polished aluminium smoking tables that have a bracket for your cigarettes and a tray for the ash. And plenty of room for your drink.
Later in the afternoon, the busy manager knocked on the door and dropped in a paper menu for the dining room. 'We're short on service tonight, so you might want to order early,' she said kindly. 'I'll make sure it's ready at the time you want to eat. Everything's on except the pork belly,' she added helpfully, with a smile; before rushing off again.
So we put in our dinner orders early. Fish for Tracy; filet mignon for me. Rare, thank you.
Six o'clock ticked around and found us sitting in the lobby, on the far side, in front of the hearth, on a comfortable old red-brown chesterfield with several buttons missing. It was the kind of chair you could spend winter in. Someone had moved half of the stacked lumber into the fireplace and lit it; and the heat was enough to melt several polar ice-caps, which was good, because as I pointed out earlier, it was going to be a cold night.
I had a drink in one hand and a baby in the other and so did Tracy. Life is a compromise with children, although which hand the compromise was in I couldn't decide.
I finished my drink and then I finished Tracy's and then we moved into the dining room. It was good that it was otherwise vacant, because you never know what babies are going to do. William and Thomas were scrubbed and buffed and polished and brushed and they had their best pyjamas on and they were already fed and Thomas might have fallen asleep in the pram and William might have played nicely with his model car or sat quietly in a high-chair; but then again they might both have screamed the house down.
The dining room had two massive pillars in the middle and gilt mirrors around the walls and more acres of carpet on the floor and all the tables were done up to the nines with starched linen and crystal and full six-piece cutlery place settings. It's been so long since I've seen six-piece cutlery place settings I've forgotten what pieces four through six are for.
Total silence in such a grand place is weird yet kind of fun; as if you are waiting expectantly for someone to clang a knife or drop a glass. But nobody did. All we could hear were distant but familiar kitchen noises: the hiss of food hitting hotplate, the chop-chop-chop of sharp knives and the muffled banter of kitchen staff. Soon, dinner came out, presented shyly by a kid who was obviously an apprentice chef. Tracy's wild barramundi was fresh and better than we've eaten a lot closer to where they swim, so someone is doing something right. My filet was perfectly rare, not just slightly pink in the middle as is so often the case when 'rare' is requested. On the side were slender boiled carrots and beans, cooked properly, not merely blanched so that you have to crunch them up like rabbits. I like my vegetables cooked, thank you. There was another accompaniment on each plate, a kind of 1950s flying saucer of which the rims were thick, circular chips of sweet potato and the middle bulge a kind of mushroom and blue cheese mixture. This place knew exactly what I like. Rare steak, cooked vegetables, blue cheese and UFOs. And all without a waiter.
We sat some more on the chesterfield afterwards and finished our wine, a magnificent Rutherglen red that you could have stood a spoon up in. The flames in the fireplace had died down to a mere bonfire and we watched them crackle and spurt for a while and then we retired for the night. The brass bedstead was about four feet off the ground and had about fifty blankets on it and it was like sleeping over at grandma's.
*
By the way, here's what the Leeton Hydro Hotel looked like in 1936. Notice, no Volvo wagons parked out front.
It sounds like a delightful place to stay. Give me a stack of books, park me by the fire and let me stay all winter.
ReplyDeleteThat sounds fantastic! Like something out of an English novel....so cosy!
ReplyDeleteIt really does sound lovely! But whenever I think of an ornate hotel without any other guests in the middle of winter, all I can picture is "The Shining." :)
ReplyDeleteAhahaha, Becky. Having stayed at the hotel where King wrote the novel, I can agree... But it sounds lovely.
ReplyDeleteIf the kitchen staff understand how you like your meat and veg it sounds absolutely perfect to me. I have never yet been to Australia, but this hotel is going on my list of "must places to stay." When I get there.
Reckon the worst thing is when you get under-cooked veg on the side.
ReplyDeleteBeans in particular. Never met a crunchy bean I liked.
What a bloody marvellous post, the kind of stuff I wish I could write if only I could get over my verbal diarrhoea... I am still fascinated by the sweet potato UFOs - stuffed while raw? Par-cooked? What?!
ReplyDelete