The Epicurean Red Hill

This place is so wonderfully decorated from the interior to exterior, the food is almost always exquisite. this time round i went in a party of 10 and they did a incredible job for each and every single one of us. my only note is that the portion sizes be adjusted slightly because if we didn’t order a dessert each, one main would not be enough to leave full but aside from that it was a beautiful experience all around

Staying in Red Hill for the weekend and decided to drop in for lunch on Friday. We nearly didn’t go into the restaurant as we thought the cafe was it. Glad we found it though. Restaurant was amazing and the food was incredible. If you are in this neck of the woods I would highly recommend a visit. Wine list is fantastic as well with lots of local wines in the region on the menu.

It seems to be fashionable to criticise this place but we have no idea why. We’ve been here five times over the years with family and we’ve always had a good experience. The setting is lovely, especially in winter with a roaring fire. We like the food. Today we had pizzas and they were lovely. The potatoes and fries were excellent. The salads were nice too and so were the desserts. The wine list is very good. There’s plenty of choice especially excellent local wines. We had a lovely local pinot gris. And the young servers here are heroically good. We will remain forever indebted to the server today who said sagely, “…you may wish to order now, as a whole heap of people have just arrived”. She was spot on. We had a party today of aged 69 to age four months and all ages in between. We all had a great time

Thanks Epicurean!! I had the most wonderful 40th birthday lunch celebration here in the private dining room. It was absolutely perfect for our group. The space was beautiful and the food… delicious! The staff, particularly Kate, went above and beyond to make the day special. I highly recommend for special occasions, we’ll definitely be back.

First time to this place. The place was fully booked. We didn't make a reservation, but the staff managed to give us a table for an hour of dining. We were truly impressed with the service. Food was a chef kiss. The pizzas, a risotto, and soft shell crab buns were yummy . Will definitely come back again.

Great dine in experience. Food was delicious! Kids friendly. Staff were very friendly. The price is not cheap, but worth it.

Received such warm & welcoming service from our lovely host Nikeeta. Food was delicious and the atmosphere was great. Will definitely be coming back!

Revisited the Epicurean this week and things have changed in 6 years. For one thing they now do take reservations so I’m not sure why they didn’t advise us they had a wedding at 5pm when we made a 2.15pm booking. We were rapidly ushered out around 3.30pm without being offered dessert which I think was absolute insanity considering I’d just paid $9 for a glass of soft drink (coke meanwhile, not even anything artisanal!). Admittedly there was a 20% public holiday surcharge but not sure how our bill came to over $310 for 4 people when there was only one glass of wine and two beers, plus the aforementioned daylight robbery soda. They didn’t even print us a bill just proceeded to offer the eftpos machine my way so I didn’t get to validate it and can only assume it was erroneous. As for the food it plated well though I wish I didn’t wait for everyone at the table to be served before I started on my gnocchi as it was cold when I did (and nor did anyone offer me any cheese which is odd to when you order pasta). The calamari my husband had was tasty as was the garlic focaccia but overall wasn’t impressed with the experience. Being rushed out without warning is far from ideal when you are travelling such a distance for a rural lunch Original review What an absolutely delightful space Epicurean is. It doesn’t look like much from the front but inside is a treasure trove of gourmet goodies for sale and then on to a huge open warehouse style restaurant with private dining rooms available for functions. Always busy, you may have to battle for a table as they do not accept bookings unless you have a large group. For more photos please see my Instagram @foodiefilesmelbourne

Starting off with the good things: lovely location, huge and open space. We sat near a fire place and it was really nice. Now onto the bad: We arrived right as the restaurant was opening and immediately got out appetizer, the focaccia bread with dips and olives. This was ok but it's also pretty hard to ruin bread and dip. The waiter stood around for nearly an hour and a half waiting for us to finish it before he even thought to bring our mains. Our main dishes were the wagyu gnocchi and the shrimp pizza (Gamberretto) as suggested by our waiter. The gnocchi came out and looked like a really simple dish. The gnocchi was mushy and the sauce was nothing special. Honestly it could've been regular ground beef and I wouldn't know the difference. I feel like if you're going to use wagyu you should make it more prominent in the dish. The Gamberretto pizza was uninspired. It just tasted like plain pizza with shrimp on it. There was no real flavor to it and was really disappointing. To add to all that the pizza was so oily or so wet that it just drooped when you picked it up :/ We debated whether or not to get the apple pie dessert. We thought it'd be just as tragic as the rest of the meal had been but ordered it anyways. It was as expected, not very good. TLDR; Great location, meh food, get drinks here instead!

The restaurant is located on a quietish street in the back of the bakery cafe. It's quiet spacious and opens to modern rustic interior. I really enjoyed the ambience of this place. This place serves Italian food. A pasta dish is around $32-$35. The food was delicious and large proportions.

Beautiful restaurant down in Mornington peninsula. Went here for a work dinner after tastings at two wineries. Woodfired pizzas, wine barrels from ever possible winery in the region and just a beautiful venue. The place is massive and you have a private area with a large wooden door for functions. There were 27 of us and from the moment we sat down to the moment we left, there was free flowing wine and food. I had the most delicious salmon pizza, salami pizza and marghErita. It was well salted and reminded me of Italy. The garden salad with rocket and radish was delicately balanced with lime and salt and perhaps vinegar. The lamb penne had a slightly spicy orange base to it. Was scrumptious. The seafood pasta had a lighter sauce and was equally delicious. Didn't really like the vegetarian risotto. Th sticky date pudding was slightly salty and you could taste the crunchy soft dates in the pudding. Sublime. Service was very efficient. The best Italian I've had to date in Melbourne.

If your heading out to Red Hill way the Epicurean is a must visit. Although it is always packed and you generally need to wait about 20 to 30 minutes it is definitely worth the wait. Staff are quite pleasant and work very quickly and efficiently. We decided to stop by for lunch for a group of 4 and decided to order several dishes to share. We had the antipasto platter, polenta chips, waygu beef pasta and the napul'e pizza (buffalo mozzarella and anchovies) and were not disappointed. Would have to say my favourite was the polenta chips!

Lovely afternoon spent with friends for a birthday celebration. We had the whole Shed to ourselves for a group of about 50 people. We were provided with a set menu of, Chartreuse boards, Bread/dips, Chard Brussel sprouts, Gnocchi, Pasta, Wild Rice Risotto, Salads, 3 types of Pizza - Veg, Smoked Salmon and Bresaola. There was a choice of House Merlot which was delicious and sparking water. Finished off with boards with selections of Petit Fours. Service was great and they catered to all dietary needs - Vegetarian, Vegan, Gluten free and Lactose free. Will definitely be back again!

Terrible food in a lovely setting and atmosphere. Every single thing we ordered was either burnt or bland. Worst meal I've had in ages. Also way overpriced for such basic, boring food.

Great service, great food, great staff. We only had one night and dozens of suggested places to eat. So glad we chose this one.

This is a spacious wooden shed like place which can fit large functions say crowds of 100 upwards or so. I arrived earlier than lunchtime to avoid long queues for a table. Delicious dips with bread were served. My main was made of penne pasta, prawns, barramundi, spring onions, and herbs. It was lightly flavoured and not overwhelming for lunch and went well with Roxy wine which ran out very quickly at this place. The interiors of the shed appeared a little on the dark side perhaps due to the rainy winter day. Staff were polite. Visited in June 2016.

I adore the main restaurant - it's my favorite decadent dinner out on the peninsula. It's for this reason that I feel so disappointed with the cafe at the front. The blatant disregard for the environment puts a sour taste in every latte... Plastic cutlery, throw away cups, individually portioned butter in conveniently disposable plastic tubs- the list goes on. With so much innovation in minimizing waste (eg Joost's pop up restaurants and kitchen compost units) it's quite sickening to me that this otherwise "trendy" place has missed this vital ingredient. I won't go back until they get with the times and cut the trash.

Great food. Great service. What more can you ask for?! Shared the assorted breads with olives & olive oil, calamari (gf) and a Dali pizza. Perfect amount for 2 people. We added lamb sausage to the Dali pizza and it was the perfect mix of veggies and just enough meat. Also tried Mornington golden ale for the first time and was very pleased. The bread was great, olives tasted fresh and calamari was a great addition. Not to mention the ambiance, old cold storage building that has been beautifully redone. Great for groups!

Regular visits here for pizza & seafood (swordfish)..always very enjoyable good coffee, good local beers and an excellent winelist .no bookings but a large place means you don't wait long for a table worth the visit for coffee and homemade pastries and breads

I attended a function at the Red Hill Epicurean .A nice venue with good food and wine.Sadly the night was ruined by the behaviour of the Manager of the venue towards his staff and customers. A young man, with limited experience in the hospitality industry obviously, he abused his staff in front of customers and displayed an appalling lack of respect to his customers.I will not go there again until they have a change of manager.

Went to this restaurant on Tuesday evening with my family. We were presented with 3 menus, plant based menu, kids menu and regular menu. The plant based menu indicated in brackets 'contains nuts' below relevant dishes. I wrongly assumed that the restaurant was consistent and would apply the same care on their other menus. We ordered from the regular and kids menu. My son received his kids menu dessert (choc brownie with vanilla cream). I was shocked that the kids menu contained dessert that had nuts with no mention of this common allergen being an ingredient. In this day and age with so many kids with allergies I am surprised the restaurant would omit such life threatening information on their KIDS menu. The other 2 desserts we ordered from their regular menu (Vegan chocolate and vanilla mousse with redhill mud crumble and 'Our' Eton mess). The crumble on the mousse looked like nuts so I called a waiter over and asked if they were nuts sprinkled on top. She went and checked with the chef and then returned and confirmef the crumble was made with nuts. I asked her that given the menu did not state this, could we get the mousse without the nut topping because my daughter is anaphylactic to nuts. She was very accommodating and took the dish back to the kitchen and delivered another serve without the nut crumble. We all ate some of the mousse but we all agreed that the vanilla mousse did not have a vanilla taste. We paid our bill ($260!) And left. As we were walking out my daughter said she felt her top lip was feeling tingly and a little numb. By the time we arrived home in dromana her throat felt tight and she vomited. I asked my husband to call the Epicurean and ask whether it was possible that the vanilla mousse contained nuts. The lady on the phone put him on hold and then returned to the phone with the following response. " It is likely that the dessert had a nut in it." She also mentioned that she too is allergic to nuts and she has no problem with that dessert. We administered claratyne and drove her to rosebud hospital with our epipen in hand. The hospital was fantastic. They took her in straight away and gave her meds. Her back and tummy was covered in hives. They administered more meds and I am happy to say that in the early ours of the morning she was released from hospital. The following morning I rang epicurean and spoke to the events manager who confirmed the dessert was made with ground cashew. ONCE AGAIN THERE WAS NO MENTION ON THE REGULAR MENU OF THE DESSERT CONTAINING NUTS! Furthermore when the dessert was returned to the kitchen and the request was made for a serve without the nut crumble, why didn't the chef or waiter flag that the actual mousse also contained nuts! Here's a simple tip Epicurean management, be consistent and reprint your regular and kids menus to include common allergens like nuts as you do on your plant based menu. Do you not think it is misleading to identify and highlight nuts on one menu and not do so on the others? By doing so, is it not reasonable for a customer to assume that if you identify dishes with nuts on one menu then any dish that does not say in brackets 'contains nuts' would be nut free?  As a parent of a child whose life was endangered by the misleading actions of your restaurant I feel compelled to spread the word so that this does not happen to others. Yes I was foolish by my false sense of security and i put one child's life at risk. You on the other hand are putting hundreds of lives at risk on a daily basis. You do this by refusing to acknowledge that your inconsistency in menu information is misleading and gives customers a false sense of security. Date of visit: January 2020

Beautifully rustic setting with large open fires. Great food. Service friendly and fast.

Love this place. Very large dining area with fires going to keep you warm in winter. Friendly service and good food. It's got an old barn feel and different to the usual eating place. Highly recommended.

If the website says you're open till 9pm and I ring up to make a booking at 6.30pm and you say no need to book just come on in and the fire is on...then we all rock up at 7pm and you say you're closed...we have a right to be pissed! Not that I cracked it...held ourselves pretty well. You, you pretentious @$;"s...you were just rude. Your place looks nice...we're local but we won't be back!

Great coffee ,delicious breads and sandwiches and pastries and friendly smiling helpfull staff - just what we needed for breakfast -