PROFILED BY DE GROOTS MEDIASometimes you get a pleasant view, a stylish decor, or a good menu. Sometimes you crack it for all three, as with The Grill Restaurant. The Royal Hotel is a tastefully refurbished heritage-listed institution; its city-corner location has Rundle Mall a stone’s throw away and the National Wine Centre opposite. The ground floor bar area serves unfussy, value-for-money meals in the spacious dining room or alfresco. Venture upstairs, however, and you step into very dignified surrounds. The ambience and menu of The Grill Restaurant are well matched: there is dark timber furnishing, royal blue carpet and cream coloured walls decorated with framed black and whites of historical pubs. “Old-school Adelaide” it definitely is, but contemporary design touches are nicely blended in, so that one settles in to dine feeling classy yet comfortable.
The bill of fare is an eclectic spread of seafood and steak, from a modern Australian kitchen with Asian and European accents. Start with a roasted pumpkin bruschetta served with mustard fruits and crispy sage. Entree standards include (Royal) Caesar and a classic dish of baked avocado filled with tiger prawns, fresh crab, and seafood aioli. Be patriotic and order Coopers-battered oysters teamed with a chilli, coriander and coconut dipping sauce. From the char grill, jumbo quail lands on a roasted pepper and cous cous salad and the Moroccan-spiced chicken will have you salivating. A whole New Zealand flounder impresses with its 400 grams of succulence, or crown your plate with the “Royal Catch” of moist garfish, sweet prawns, pillow-soft calamari, and smoky Kilpatrick oysters. Surf and Turf arrives as a 300 gram, char-grilled prime porterhouse with tiger prawns, garlic herb cream and a whopping Idaho potato. After dessert, waddle outside onto the ornate balcony and watch the neighbourhood ducks in their parkland ponds below.
Roz Taylor