Past and present, Australian and Asian, local produce and worldly thinking: this Busselton treasure offers a way forward for the beloved neighbourhood pub.
Australian$$
Named after Augustus Frederick, Prince Street features prominently in the story of Busselton.
Here be the sites of the town’s first school, first post office and – that yesteryear symbol of modernity and progress – first drycleaners. Following the purchase of 43 Prince Street in January 1965 by Aubrey Nelson, Busseltonians had access to professional laundering services, no matter how pressed for time they were.
Just like the township, this site has seen plenty of change. The most notable of these happened in 2012 when chef Tim Whitty (nee Taylor; formerly of Margaret River winery restaurants Clairault and Leeuwin Estate) took it from laundry to the Laundry Cafe: a small bar modelled on the laneway speakeasies of Melbourne.
And so began the site’s hospitality era. Since changing cycles, the space has housed everything from breweries (Rocky Ridge’s Darleen’s lived here pre-COVID) to tapas joints a la Bodega Busselton. Two years ago, the building was passed on to current custodians, Brendan McCarthy and Nathan Headlam: two publicans who felt Busso’s growing population could sustain another local drinking hole.
Enter Banksia Tavern, a svelte, 120-person longneck of a space that dresses like a 90s country pub yet is au fait with contemporary drink trends. Small-scale local brewers such as District Brewing dominate the taps, there’s snap in the cocktails, plus temptation and intrigue in the whisky line-up. If you want a place to catch-up over drinks or enjoy a civilised nightcap, you’re in luck. But heads up: obliging service led by manager Rav Purwaha plus a crisp vinyl-based sound system – McCarthy and Headlam were musos in previous lives – might derail that just-one-more thinking.
Banksia’s food offering is another key asset and reason enough to visit, especially during those moments when the body craves for what it knows. Although much of the compact menu has been, unsurprisingly, given over to pub classics, these favourites have been quietly considered through the thoughtful gaze of chef Laura Koentjoro Harding.
Typically, this contemplation translates to the application of imperceptible one-percenters. One-percenters like cutting Maris Piper potatoes to fry into pale, crisp “chippies” that, as far as size and crunch go, are more chip than French fries. Or doctoring the house burger sauce with dribbles of otherwise lethal Hot Ones chilli sauce. Or turning the head meat and trim from whole fish into the MVP of fish finger sandwiches. (Like Banksia’s terrific take on the Whopper-esque, pub hamburger, the fish finger sandwiches are a lunch-only item.)
As keen-eyed restaurant observers know, Koentjoro cooked with former Noma head chef Ben Ing at Alberta’s: a workplace, I’m sure, that reinforced the value of both provenance and technique.
Yet Alberta’s is just one passage in Koentjoro’s cooking story. If you know where to look, other dishes on Banksia Tavern’s menu will reveal other key chapters.
Those glorious fried chicken wings glossy with a sticky fish sauce caramel? A memento of tasting Andy Ricker’s Pok Pok chicken wings when he cooked at Long Chim Perth almost a decade ago.
Lamb birria tacos brightened with white onion are a souvenir from helping open Mount Hawthorn’s Casa and learning Mexican(ish) cooking from Paul Bentley.
The focaccia, meanwhile, winds the clock back to Koentjoro’s teenage years and her first hospitality job as an assistant at the bakery that her chef mother Widijanti worked with.
To paraphrase legendary musician Rick James, nostalgia is a hell of a drug. A drug, it seems, that’s finding its way unchecked into so many hospitality businesses.
Banksia Tavern and its interpretation of the country pub is a shining example of nailing that delicate balance between past and present. Impressively, it goes about its business with a minimum of tell and more low-key show.
I don’t know how long Banksia Tavern will be around for, but I plan on becoming a regular, especially as Koentjoro delves deeper into her Indonesian heritage. (See seasonal desserts such as an absurdly lush coconut panna cotta ringed by ripe persimmon plus her irregular Spice is Nice events where she’ll showcase regional specialties such as a Betawi-style soup noodle.)
Busselton – or to use the town’s traditional Nyoongar name, Undalup – might be changing, but Prince Street looks set to remain integral to its story.
The low-down
Atmosphere: a sterling regional watering hole that’s taking pub dining back to the future.
Go-to dishes: fried chicken wings in fish sauce caramel, The Banksia Burger.
Drinks: an exciting line-up of things to drink with a strong focus on cocktails, spirits and beers.
Cost: about $150 for two people, excluding drinks.
Good Food reviews are booked anonymously and paid independently. A restaurant can’t pay for a review or inclusion in the Good Food Guide.
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Max Veenhuyzen is a journalist and photographer who has been writing about food, drink and travel for national and international publications for more than 20 years. He reviews restaurants for the Good Food Guide.
