Last night Danelle and I went out to dinner – our first few hours alone in 8

weeks of traveling. It was nice to get away from the little people for a

while.

It’s always hard to know where to go for a good feed, especially when in a

different city. A rough internet search finished up with me suggesting we

try The Jetty, a buffet restaurant down by the water and pretty reasonably

priced.

They advertise themselves as ‘Steak & Seafood’ so I figured there was

something for everyone. We got there in time for sunset – which actually

didn’t matter because you couldn’t see the sunset… and decided on an

outside table on the verandah right over the water. You could tell you were

in Darwin by the sign on the wall that said ‘please don’t feed the fish or

crocodiles’…

It was a balmy Darwin night and it was a beautiful spot to be. The waiter

took our wine order and the wine came about 20 minutes later, a little after

we had eaten our first course… the first sign they were understaffed or a

little disorganized.

The food was a mix of the superb and the very ordinary – but then that’s to

be expected at a buffet. The cold seafood was great, the steak superb and

the veggies very nice. The chilli crab was dry as a bone, the ‘crab claw’

was seafood extender wrapped in breadcrumbs and the pork in plum sauce was

more batter than pork. Still there was enough there to enjoy and plenty of

variety to savour.

When it was time for sweets the options were passionfruit cheesecake, fruit

salad or two varieties of sponge cake with either lemon icing or chocolate

icing. My tip would be to get rid of the sponge cake. It gave it that

‘sizzler’ feel and didn’t do anyone any favours.

We bravely ordered a coffee and then went to get some sweets to enjoy with

the coffee. Forty five minutes later the sweets were gone and the coffee

hadn’t arrived. We managed to grab a waiter and 15 minutes later had the

second lamest coffee I have had in a long time – a tasteless weak flat white

made from stale beans. I knew it was a gamble, but it was still pretty

awful.

We drank the coffee and headed for the exit where the total cost was $75.00

– for dinner and wine (we agreed that the coffee shouldn’t be paid for…)

All in all pretty good value for money given the nature of the restaurant.