Canberra's best restaurants: Grazing

Top 20 restaurants, Food and Wine Annual 2014: number 15.

We've always been enarmoured of Grazing for the country atmospherics and the old building, where everything except the width of the walls (and the size of the serves) seems made for smaller people.

In reality, of course, it's not our physical size that's grown in 150 years, just our greed for space. At Grazing, you'll dine in little rooms, with big fires, at old tables that keep you in touch with the history of this mid 19th-century hotel. What you need here is a greed for food, because there is a determined generosity in the amount of food you're served, and a hearty country focus in the style. While the romance has always won a big tick from us, in more recent times the food also has risen to the occasion.

On our most recent visit, we were struck by an increased sense of elegance and balance on the plate. Duck liver pate is mild, served with walnut sourdough and great fried celery leaves. Ox cheek is braised in pedro ximenez, shredded and packed together into a seared round, served with grated horseradish and roast baby carrots – a very good dish.

The thick steak is properly cooked, served with a tomato salsa and a potato bun, which is oddly flavoured with smoked veal marrow. Kids' meals are offered here and they're done seriously – proper fish, fresh salads, homemade ice-cream. Adult desserts are super-good also – a dense, unsweet chocolate fondant with stewed rhubarb and a chestnut ice-cream filled with chunks of toffee. A caramel and salted hazelnut semifreddo is served with good chocolate ice-cream.

The wine list is pretty much all local, with a big focus on Capital Wines, which owns the building, but if you order by the bottle you will find most of the good local wines here as well.

Grazing
The Royal Hotel, Cork Street, Gundaroo. 6236 8777. grazing.com.au
Owners Kurt and Tanya Neumann; chef Kurt Neumann
Lunch Friday to Sunday and most public holidays. Dinner Thursday to Saturday.