The Firehouse

Location: Maroondah Highway, Ringwood
Cuisine: Western
Company: Mark

~Food~
For a relatively new place, the food was absolutely divine. The menu is interesting. You can either have a meal of small tapas dishes (small entree size dishes) or pick one as an entree and have the usual entree-main-dessert combo. I love the tapas idea. Esp with a group of friends, you get to try a little of everything and not end up over ordering like usual!
We got the marinated octopus- it was fresh and delicious.

Mains where salty, crispy skin duck and angus beef 400g rib eye. The duck itself was beautiful. Very fresh and the skin was delicious. It made a nice change to the usual peking duck! It came with a strange mandarin/apple/potato salad... i didn't like the flavour but it was also very fresh. The beef was also incredibly fresh and juicy. It came with mash (cant go wrong with mash) and beef jus.

The only problem was everything was slightly undersalted for my liking but you can easily add more salt.

I loved the obvious quality of the ingredients used and the fact that they were very mindful of the fructose issue, allowing us to have the jus on the side and taking time to check with the chefs.

~Atmosphere and Service~
The restaurant is very well decorated. It is set inside the old firestation and has retained the charm. There are several small rooms (perfect for functions) and everything is a pretty red colour.

Our waitress was possibly the nicest server I've ever come across. Very helpful but not overly intrusive. Took a lot of care with the fructose as mentioned above. Big ticks there!

~Price~
Slightly pricey, about $7 for starters (they are small though) and $27-30 for mains. Well worth it for the quality but at the moment only for special occasions! (this one being my birthday keke) Once we have nice, full time employment I think the prices are actually quite reasonable.

~Overall Impression~
10/10- Good food, great service, felt the meal was worth the money we spent.