First taste: Bountiful, beautiful Beltana Farm food

Posted on 7 February, 2024

When we brought you news of the expansive new restaurant, luxe accommodation site, and truffle orchard that is Beltana Farm, we hadn’t yet tasted a thing.

Now, having been served a magical lunch under the vaulted timber-lined ceilings while gazing at the truffle trees outside and the enormous stone fireplace inside, we can attest it tastes as good as it looks.

With John Leverink running the kitchen, we had set the benchmark high.

The HerCanberra team takes one for the city by trying out the lunch menu at Beltana Farm before it opens. Don’t hate us cos you aint us—it’s research!

But his thoughtful and pared back, share-plate style of food really surpassed our expectations. As did the flavour bursts, freshness, and execution.

Take, for instance, the salads.

John’s tomato salad combined rich red and yellow tomatoes (grown in one of his 12 flourishing garden beds on-site) with sweet basil, firm peaches and a tangy vinaigrette using pickled eschalots.

It’s a simple dish that became a star of the table.

Even the farm leaves with verjuice were also savoured, rather than being maligned during the meal, as is the fate of many a limp lettuce.

Truffle and cuttlefish salami and pickles.

While John’s other baby, The Boat House, is classic food suited more to a traditional fine dining restaurant, and Canteen is a place for slurping up his exemplary ramen, Beltana Farm is a venue where John is able to inject a bit more “fun” into the food experience.

“We were inspired by a move to lighter dining, and the menu is made up of unashamedly Australian ingredients, forming an Australian farm table menu with a focus on light, fresh and seasonal produce,” he says.

“It is more a relaxed feel, great for groups, and this same style is reflected in the all-Australian wine list, with an understandable exception made for champagne.”

While the HerCanberra team is, indeed, always eager for champagne, we headed in a different direction as sommelier Thomas Blakely wheeled up his drinks cart to serve us an aperitif of truffle shortbread schnapps.

The potato galette, swimming in buttermilk…

It’s a little nod to the farm’s truffle orchard although it is by no means a restaurant where truffle is forced upon the food.

“We want to use truffle seasonally and simply,” says the restaurant’s General Manager James Souter, who is also GM at The Boat House and owns Margot Bar by the lake.

Once the warm and truffly schnapps has been drunk, the food arrives.

First to the table are little fluffy pillows of potato damper sprinkled liberally with olive oil and an “Aussie” dukkha blended from macadamia nuts and lemon myrtle alongside the classic cumin and sesame seed. One of us may have fallen so deeply in love with the potato damper in that moment, that she devoured four serves in a heady rush and vows to return for more… But I digress.

Potato damper. So simple. So utterly perfect and delicious in every way. I could go on, but this is a caption so I need to stop now. Apologies.

A South Coast Swordfish fillet is chargrilled and covered with a tangy roasted fennel, black olive and cucumber salsa, while the White Pyrenes Lamb is served with burnt onions, bone marrow and farm salt bush. Both are exceptional.

A bowl of salt-baked potatoes with rosemary provides a simple counterpoint to an exquisite rotund potato galette with carrot and sage and a rich sauce of buttermilk and tarragon oil for those days when too much potato is never enough.

The meal is finished with an Anzac biscuit cheesecake served with Pialligo honey (Beltana will shortly have its own buzzing little bee colony amid the truffiere) which is then atomised liberally with whisky by John once he sets it on the table—another stand-out dish we can’t get enough of.

If your cheesecake is not spritzed with whiskey at the table then are you even eating dessert?

We cannot end this story without remarking on how truly beautiful the Terry Ring-designed restaurant is. It is cavernous in size and yet remains a warm and enveloping experience thanks to the wood, stone and marble. The earthy ceramic plates, wildflowers and heavy linen napkins provide texture while the eye is constantly drawn to the orchard to one side and row of bespoke yurts and accommodation cottage to the other.

Last but not least, there is a broody dark private dining room off the main al fresco dining pavilion which offers a more intimate place in which to fall in love (perhaps with the potato damper). We predict this place is going to be a crowd-pleaser locally, while also showing the rest of the nation just how well Canberran culinary talent can create a remarkable dining experience.

And most of the team has made another booking for when Beltana Farm opens officially on February 16.

Photography:James Souter.