Trackside Restaurant

Description

The Trackside Restaurant is located in West Gosford on the corner of the Central Coast Hwy and Mans Road and is attached to a Domayne department store. For quite a while now the fact that it was attached to the Domayne lead me to overlook the place as a place to go and eat, however after seeing the Stone Grill cooking sign we eventually decided to give it a go.

Aside from being attached to the department store, the building is quite nice to look at from the outside. It reminds me a bit of the American style strip mall restaurant with lots of glass and palm trees. Inside, as if the name weren’t enough to give it away, the motor racing theme really comes into its own. The displays of authentic racing cars and racing memorabilia are impressive without being overpowering.

As a side note, the place seemed to be very child friendly. There is a kid’s play room and all of the staff were very nice to our daughter.

If I did have to make a criticism of the appearance of the place, I’d have to say it was the large flat screen TV’s that they had going. As it’s a motor racing themed venue I’d have assumed that if they did have to put something on that it would be motor sport related. Instead, the screens just seemed to have an endless loop of ads for what was on in the restaurant on the other days of the week. I guess this isn’t normally too bad but our table was right under one of the screens.

The Meal

Well as I mentioned earlier, it was the stone grill sign that initially sparked my interest in the place so it should be no surprise that we both decided to order from the stone grill menu. I had the mixed grill and my wife chose the fillet steak. The mixed grill was made up of Beef, Lamb and Chicken, all cuts were nice and tender as well as being fairly generous in size. Both selections came with a side salad and beer battered chips. The salad was fresh and of a good standard and the chips were very nice and crunchy. To finish we decided to share a portion of Macadamia Nut Cheese Cake. The dessert was nice but felt like it was bought in rather than freshly made.

For those that don’t know, a Stone Grill is basically a slab of granite that is heated in the oven for a few hours until its a few hundred degrees all the way through. The rock is then placed on a serving plate and is presented to you at your table with your uncooked meat sitting on top of it for you to slice up and cook just the way you like it. Because the rock is very slow to release its heat, there is no rush to cook all of the meat and you can have a nice leisurely meal without worrying about it going cold.

The service was, I’m happy to say very good. I’ve eaten in several others of this style of restaurant where it was clear that the staff were just there for the pay check and didn’t really care about the customers. This was a definite exception to the rule. The wait staff were all friendly, seemed fairly knowledgeable and were happy to help.

Ratings

Food

Service

Appearance

Phone: (02) 4322 4433
Address: Corner Central Coast Highway & Manns Road, West Gosford, NSW 2250
Web: www.trackside-restaurant.com.au

Stone grill is the way to go. Providing the cuts of meat are good, there is no excuse and no one to blame if your meal isn’t cooked properly. For something different, I’d definitely recommend it.

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