Bistro Vite

Posted by: R Waterworth | 5 April 2011, 10.58am

Enjoyed a wonderful evening at Bistro Vite. The view at Yarras Edge overlooking the marina is beautiful by night. The tasting plate for 2 is fabulous and teamed with a salad and fries, plentiful. Just enough room for a gorgeous dessert. Atmosphere relaxed, staff helpful and friendly. Thanks

Food:			Visit: Tue 5 April 2011 Mealtime: dinner
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Posted by: joochie | 1 April 2011, 3.21pm

How good to find Bistro Vite originally at Southbank now relocated to Docklands.
Picture this, left rainy Sydney to land in sunny Melbourne, (true). Made my way to Bistro Vite at Docklands to meet with friends to enjoy delicious, tender calamari, seafood pasta with a glass of vino. The staff were friendly & informative, ambience relaxing - looking out over water. Cannot wait to return for dinner as believe the steak is still fantastic as at the previous Bistro Vite before it relocated. Fantastic

Food:			Visit: Sun 20 March 2011 Mealtime: lunch
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Posted by: MinesaJD | 10 May 2008, 10.47am

Myself and himself work odd hours, and as a result we're big Friday afternoon diners. Too late for lunch and too early for dinner, we like to wander in at 3.30 in the afternoon and leave a couple of hours later, buzzing gently with alcohol, the evening but a pup, laid out ahead of us and ripe for the picking. That's what brought us to Bistro Vite in the Southgate precinct last Friday.

Bistro Vite has an enormous riverside seating area under a canopy, which was a little chilly for May so we ignored the "please wait to be seated" sign and wandered inside. Friday afternoon dining has its risks - a lot of places are closed, and those that are open invariably include a table of stuffy businessmen conducting an afternoon meeting, and another table of ladies who lunch, getting comfortably and loudly inebriated. Both were in evidence at Bistro Vite, and our waiter offered us a choice of three seats equidistant from both groups.

We were seated and offered drinks, opting for Crown Lager at $6 apiece. A bottle of water was brought to the table automatically with the beer and we settled in to peruse the menu and the specials.

For starters, he went for kangaroo carpaccio with horseradish cream, garlic chips and baby herbs. Unexpectedly, the kangaroo had been seared on the outside - not cooked as much as just shown a hot pan. It was sliced more thickly than either of us fancied - inch thick slices, as opposed to the fine, paper-thin pieces you'd expect from a carpaccio. The resulting chewing experience meant the horseradish and garlic chips were a welcome relief from mouthfuls of thick, jelly-like slices of raw kangaroo.

I opted for the seared scallops with a fennel panna cotta and an apple remoulade and roasted walnuts. Four tiny scallops, each balanced on a flattened teaspoon of apple remoulade, were served around a moulded hemisphere of panna cotta that was large enough to mean the menu should be reworded to read "fennel panna cotta with scallops". Actually, just plain "panna cotta with scallops" might be more fair, because there was little fennel flavour in evidence. Similarly, the apple remoulade contained a single, passing wave of roasted walnut and a rather stronger tidal wave of horseradish. The scallop starter benefited from the proffered crank of cracked black pepper, which isn't necessarily a good thing for diners who might refuse that offer.

For our main courses I went for oven-roasted duck breast served on minted pea risoni with a citrus port reduction, and himself selected a slow-cooked lamb shoulder from the specials menu. We waited 20 minutes for the main courses, and ordered a second round of drinks from a second waiter, our first waiter no longer being anywhere in evidence.

The minted pea risoni was a revelation in fresh-tasting zippiness, a beautiful counter to the richness of the duck. Two thick slices of duck breast, piled on the pea risoni, were served well done, and the first bite hinted at some heavy duty chewing to come. However the skin was crispy and juicy and the duck proved to be less effort and more enjoyment start to finish. Unfortunately the citrus port reduction had been reduced so much as to be hardly in evidence at all. I didn't mind, I was too busy enjoying the peas.

The lamb special was meltingly tender, served with a boisterous, garlicky red wine jus and topped with sweet cherry tomatoes, roasted on the vine. A wedge of potato frittata completed the special without necessarily improving it and the garlic came back to haunt us a number of times throughout the evening. Garlic is a very personal allium, thankfully always welcome at our table.

On completing our main courses, the risk of Friday afternoon dining kicked in. We sat in front of our empty plates from 5.20pm to 5.50pm, abandoned by waiter number two, who'd left to serve customers under the front awning. Eventually we got the attention of the maitre'd, and asked to see the menu for desserts, only to be told our table was reserved and she needed to check what time it was needed at. This was met with utterly stony faces - we were feeling 30 minutes of neglect - and she rallied magnificently, adding "So if it's booked, I'll need to move them somewhere else."

We opted for a cheese platter with a roquefort and a Tasmanian brie, with a round of never-disappointing frangelico liqueurs. The cheeses, at $7 a slice, were offered with muscatels and decidedly un-French lavosh crackers.

The plate arrived bearing an enormous slice of bawdy, mature roquefort, shouting its presence next to a dwarfed wedge of perfectly ripe, the-cat-drank-it brie, along with a small pile of lavosh crackers, a bunch of sweet, chilled muscatels and a handful of raw walnuts. I briefly thought of my scallop starter and wondered if the walnuts had arrived late. The brie was marvellous, the roquefort proved too much and by the end of our meal the last of it wasn't as much shouting as weeping, neglected, on an empty plate while we looked uncomfortable and waved for the bill.

We paid the bill with waiting staff number three, a Canadian waitress working her first night, who apologised for not knowing which of the bill, credit card slip and credit card copy were to go to us or be kept by her. Meal for two including starters, main courses, cheese, two beers, two liqueurs and a coffee stumbled in at a rather steep $130.50, a figure that would have been higher with a tip if it hadn't been for the poor tag-team waiting service.

Food:			Visit: Fri 9 May 2008 Mealtime: afternoon tea
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Posted by: J1 | 14 February 2008, 11.22pm

For a valentines dinner, the atmosphere was pleasant. We sat outside in comfortable surrounds with good lighting and nice scenary. Service was a little slow and our mains took a while to come out. The food was average, not your typical French cuisine.It was below what I expected and the presentation lacked the french touch.

Food:			Visit: Thu 14 February 2008 Mealtime: dinner
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