It is day two of our journey from the Great Ocean Road in Victoria to South Australia and after leaving Port Fairy we take the two and a half hour drive to Coonawarra stopping by the lovely Blue Lake in Mount Gambier, South Australia which changes colours depending on the time of the year from a startling blue to a grey. At the moment it is a lovely bright blue shade.

We arrive at the Coonawarra region which is a wine region known for their cabernets due to the soil profile (terra rossa on top of limestone) and cool climate. It’s a warm, sunny day and we stretch and make our way into Hollick wines.

Relatively flat vineyard

Soil profile showing the various layers

We are dining at Upstairs at Hollick which is the restaurant attached to the cellar door. The restaurant is open Wednesday to Sunday for lunch and Saturday nights for dinner. The dining room seats 75 people and opens out onto the vineyards where the first thing that strikes you is how flat the land is here for a vineyard! Also an intersting site is the soil profile that they’ve dug up to show you exactly how layered the soil is and how the bright orange terra rossa sits on top of the white limestone.

Cream of Wilgha zucchini and basil soup, sour cream, basil oil served with 2010 Hollick Sauvignon Blanc Savignin Semillon

The menu focuses on local Limestone Coast produce and they also use produce from their farm both here on the property as well as another property 800 metres away called Wilgha Farm. The soup features the Wilgha farm zucchini and is creamy with a hint of basil, two small dollops of sour cream and a drizzle of basil oil. It has a bit of texture still in it from the vegetables and is a generous serving size.

Roasted chicken breast, green pea nad chervil risotto, green beans, chardonnay cream sauce served with 2010 Hollick “Bond Road” Chardonnay

The roasted chicken breast was quite moist and I liked the crunchy edged pea and chervil risotto cake. It was served with a Chardonnay cream sauce and it was served with a Chardonnay to match.

Scotch fillet of local beef, potato maxim, broccoliini, salsa verde butter, shiraz and rosemary jus served with 2009 Hollick “Tannery Block” Cabernet Merlot

The scotch fillet was a little tough for me although I liked the potato maxim with the middle layer of beef.

But without a second to waste we are off to visit some wineries in the area! Our first stop is the rustic and charming Kidman Winery where the cellar door is housed in a 1850 cottage. Susie Kidman greets us and it has been an exciting day for them as a cow gave birth to a calf this morning. They run livestock (their lamb is stocked at Coles) as well as the winery and Susie tends to the livestock while Sid tends to the vines.

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The challenge: to find a restaurant in Sydney that has been open since the 1980s that we hadn’t yet visited. A harder task than one would think. We needed somewhere to eat that matched Viggo’s car-a mint condition black Trans Am a la Kit from Knight Rider. I asked friends and Teena came up with the idea of Harry’s Singapore Chilli Crab in Surry Hills and it was an excellent suggestion. Open since 1982, the year that Knight Rider started, it seemed entirely fitting.

There is a large illuminated sign with Harry’s face on the outside and a flashing neon red open sign. Attached to the Triple Ace Bar the entrance is to the left hand side. There are signs with vivid pictures of the dishes and people – not celebrities but regular people from companies such as Arnotts and British Airways. I chuckle, I can imagine my dad saying “Look they work at big companies like Arnotts and British Airways, they must be a big deal.”

We walk up the stairs and there are hard shelled crabs in Styrofoam boxes in the foyer. There are pictures of celebrities lining the glory wall (I’m afraid I just recognise The Veronicas but I’m hopeless at sports people). The crabs sit there their pincers tied up with pink plastic twine, their eyes occasionally twitching and darting around. Sorry Crabby, you are cute but you are also the subject of the restaurant’s name and I suspect you’re not feeling very lucky tonight…

Viggo and Louise are sitting waiting for us. The room looks like a cross between a home crossed with operatic set style curtains in various places. The restaurant is full of people this Saturday night. We notice that Viggo has an ice bucket with six beers in it. “Thirsty?” we inquire laughing but no, apparently diners that order beer are offered an ice bucket of six cold bottles and a bottle opener so that they can help themselves whenever they want.

Dining during Chinese New Year means that two raffle tickets sit on the table. Louise explains that these are for the draw where they give out prizes and they didn’t need to buy the tickets, they were just given out. The menu is a laminated two side menu, one with set meals or platters (the top row looks a bit pedestrian whilst the bottom row looks better with the mud crab options). But of course you can’t really go here without trying the mud crab cooked in Singapore chilli sauce which is a sweet, spicy and slightly vinegary thick sauce. We order a range of dishes including a medium sized mud crab-around 2.5 kilos. Cocktails include every fruity cocktail you could think of as well as a “blonde porn star” and “dirty carpet disco” along with their Singapore Sling in a jug or a glass.

Salt and pepper calamari $20.90

The salt and pepper calamari comes out first and it has a good amount of seasoning as well as chilli, green onions and finely diced garlic on top. The calamari is tender and crunchy but not greasy at all.

Gado Gado salad $12

There’s quite a long wait and then the salad appears. And I must admit that I was very worried when I saw that this was our Gado Gado salad. Because as you can see it is a mixed green leaf salad with coins of cucumber and a sweet satay sauce. There’s none of the other adornments of a gado gado salad and the only thing I can think is that this is what Mr NQN might make if left to his own devices to make a gado gado salad.

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