A 20-seat vine-covered cottage, a bistro with stunning views and a restaurant in a rainforest are giving us reasons to go regional.
It’s another of those miserable days South East Queensland has been suffering through of late. Thick sheets of rain, one after another, slow the drive from Brisbane to Nambour, then up, up and further up the range to Mapleton in the Sunshine Coast hinterland.
It means it’s late when I step into Mapleton Public House (2 Flaxton Drive, Mapleton) for Thursday lunch. Yet, the place is packed.
Not long ago, this was just a charming weatherboard pub pouring pints for locals. That was until 2022, when husband-and-wife team Ben Johnston and Jessica Huddart bought the place.
Johnston and Huddart are best known in food circles as owners of The Falls Farm, which supplies specialist produce to heavyweight Brisbane restaurants such as Agnes and Essa. (They also own respected design business Josephmark. Remember when Timberlake-era Myspace switched to sideways scrolling? That was them.)
Together with veteran chef Cameron Matthews, they intended to tap the produce from their farm to create the ultimate paddock-to-plate restaurant. In the process, they’ve become stars of a new wave of elevated eateries in the South East Queensland region.
Brisbane and, to a lesser extent, the Gold and Sunshine coasts, have long boasted nationally recognised restaurants, but that often failed to translate beyond the cities. Over an expansive spread from that day’s menu, Huddart sits down to talk about what’s changed.
The weather might be obscuring the pub’s usually spectacular views towards the coast, but the colour on the plate makes up for it: the vivid green of farm-picked cucumber and 18-month pickled peppers, the rich red of house-cured roo salumi and rosella jam, or ’nduja-braised sugarloaf.
Matthews is a long-term regional specialist – he cut his teeth at Simone’s in Victoria’s Bright and later led that kitchen – but the challenge of rewriting his menu depending on what’s coming out of the farm that week (or day) has added extra verve to his cooking. Everything pops with attention-grabbing flavour.
“People feel more tied to their produce now,” Huddart says. “They’re interested in that provenance, and we’ve been investing in the farm now for 12 years. It’s a story we’re trying to tell of food grown with care.
“I think there’s a correlation between the rise of regional dining and young people pushing out of the cities, or exploring outside of the cities, particularly since the pandemic. It’s a rising tide that lifts all boats locally … but also throughout the region.”
Jack Stuart agrees. Head an hour southwest of Brisbane, deep into the Scenic Rim region, with its pretty patchwork of farms and dramatic ranges, and you’ll hit sleepy Boonah.
There’s a pub, a brace of bakeries, and an RSL. Then there’s Blume (5 Church Street, Boonah), a handsome 24-seater that Stuart opened in an old timber shopfront in 2022. A veteran of Congress Wine in Melbourne, Stuart had considered opening a restaurant in Brisbane when he fell for this beguiling, light-filled space with its timber floors and pressed metal walls.
“I think there’s a movement in the Scenic Rim, especially,” Stuart says. “You have Essen in Stanthorpe and Myrtille in Crows Nest. But I definitely want to do something else in the Scenic Rim.”
Stuart fell in love with producers such Scenic Rim Mushrooms, Tommerup’s Dairy Farm and Valley Pride (for target beetroots), among many others, which he heroes on his seasonal menu.
“Recently, I met a lady, Chris Greenwall, who has an acreage,” Stuart says. “She was at the market selling beautiful Jerusalem artichokes. We’ve started a relationship and next year’s artichokes are just for Blume … That’s a dream come true.”
Clarissa Pabst has a similar relationship to local produce in her native Stanthorpe. Situated 218 kilometres southwest of Brisbane near the NSW border, this is the Granite Belt region.
Almost 900 metres above sea level, it’s known for the Euro-inflected wines from producers such as Bent Road and Golden Grove. But pre-pandemic, when Pabst moved back to town, there wasn’t much of a food scene to go with it. “There was no one really matching food to the wine,” she says.
Her response in 2019 was to open Essen (2 McGregor Terrace, Stanthorpe), a cosy 20-seat restaurant in an old vine-covered cottage. Not that Pabst pairs wine to her contemporary menu, but a BYO permit encourages diners to explore the surrounding wineries before visiting.
The other appeal of opening in the regions? Cost.
Pabst reckons it would’ve been much harder to open Essen in the city, where rents are higher and there’s more competition. Also, Brisbane has, in recent decades, tended to lack the smaller tenancies that give a young chef-patron scope to throw ideas at the wall.
“Regional dining is a great way to get into the market,” Stuart confirms. “You can open small with lower outgoings in a destination. For me, the rent wasn’t crazy – that, on top of the produce, meant it added up.”
Five more spots to visit
Spirit House
The South East’s most celebrated regional restaurant remains vital. Chef Tom Hitchcock’s cooking is based on Thai techniques but also reaches towards Indonesia and the Philippines. The restaurant’s setting inside its own rainforest is fabulous escapism. Book ahead. spirithouse.com.au
The Paddock
Head into the Gold Coast hinterland to discover this light-filled pavilion with views across boutique country retreat Beechmont Estate. A long lunch here experiencing chefs Chris and Alex Norman’s Euro-influenced food is a neat escape from the region’s sweltering summers. beechmontestate.com.au/the-paddock-restaurant
The Peak at Spicers Peak Lodge
Set within Australia’s highest sub-alpine lodge, The Peak is the pick of Spicers’ accomplished South East Queensland restaurants on location alone. Chef Gareth Newburn, who has a particular interest in native ingredients, uses produce from nearby Scenic Rim and Lockyer Valley. spicersretreats.com/restaurants/peak-restaurant
Host
Toowoomba was overdue for something like Host when it opened as Zev’s Bistro in 2016. Chef-patron Kyle Zevenbergen isn’t afraid to toy with surprising flavours, and the restaurant’s street-art cool fitout accounts for the rest of its charm. hostdinewine.com
Myrtille
From the ashes of much-loved Emeraude in nearby Hampton came Myrtille, a theatrical bistro that was restored by the Hinds family in Crows Nest in 2022. It draws big weekend crowds, so book ahead to experience an accomplished French-influenced menu. myrtille.com.au
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Matt Shea is Food and Culture Editor at Brisbane Times. He is a former editor and editor-at-large at Broadsheet Brisbane, and has written for Escape, Qantas Magazine, the Guardian, Jetstar Magazine and SilverKris, among many others.
