You can almost hear the scratch of chalk on blackboard at Staguni, the former Marananga Primary School which sat forlorn for three decades until a local developer saw potential in its beautiful old bones. The site is now home to a collective of creative businesses, including a pottery studio, New Wave Wines cellar door, and a flower farm.
Reminders of its scholastic past remain; among them, the original blackboard scrawled with local Barossa wines by the glass (you’ll also see a scribble by a principal, dated 1952). The small, beautifully executed menu is printed on the kind of paper used when pen licences were a thing.
The dishes, inspired by chef Clare Falzon’s Maltese roots, have heritage at heart. If you’ve visited Malta, expect an archipelago of memories triggered by hobz biz-zejt (thick bread slices) with a medley of tomato, capers and olive oil; and curry roasted macadamia (a nod to curried pea pastizzi).
It’s fresh, authentic and unpretentious. Crudités offer satisfying crunch below mustard and coriander seed cream. Red wine braised baby octopus sits atop wet polenta, and tomato and peach salad pops alongside lamb, spinach and feta fillo pie thanks to cinnamon, star anise and Sichuan pepper oil.
Falzon’s family arrived in Australia in the 1950s and the chef fondly remembers childhood lunches at her Nan’s involving a table piled with Maltese dishes including bean salad, baked macaroni (imqarrun il-forn), and qassatat; all made from scratch and designed to share.
That’s what Falzon channels here; a communal, high-quality spread served as a set menu on Thursday nights and à-la-carte lunch from Friday to Monday with Barrio snacks on the verandah from 4pm to 6pm. Try the sensational non-alcoholic cocktail menu, a highlight of which is the rose, grapefruit and rosemary tea.
Ingredients are hyper local. Falzon forged relationships with local farmers during her time as executive chef at nearby Hentley Farm. The décor also draws on the surrounding landscape. A vase of orange flowering gum greets diners as they enter the dining space, each table dotted with a leucadendron sprig picked from Falzon’s backyard.
Two-toned walls match the gum trees (bark on top, leaves below). The simple backdrop allows emotion to shine. Falzon’s father died when she was 10 and one of her favourite photos pictures his smile lighting up the kitchen. She’d watch him make rabbit stew and use his hands to pick up bones and slurp marrow.
Raw appreciation like that is welcome here.
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