Western Australia’s dining scene rarely stands still. From festivals to one-off collaborations to quiet menu reinventions, there is always something worth adding to the calendar.
Off Menu is the WAGFG’s answer to that. A regular edit from our senior team of the events and occasions shaping the State’s food and drink calendar. This is required reading for those who keep a close eye on what’s worth booking ahead.
Melissa Palinkas weekend lunch residency at Willespie Estate in Margaret River
A new chapter for one of Margaret River’s original estates, and one of Perth’s most respected chefs. Melissa Palinkas, the chef behind a decade of Young George in East Fremantle, takes up residency at Willespie Estate from 30 May. Saturdays bring The Long Table: fifty people, four courses, a verandah, and whatever Western Australia’s paddocks and coastline are offering that week. Sundays are Braizen: open fire, one hero dish, no fuss. Willespie is one of the region’s founding estates, and this is its first major hospitality move under new ownership. Worth the drive. Bookings here
Island Cellar Nights: The First Pour Sunsets Bar and Dining, The Lodge Wadjemup, Rottnest Island
Sunday 20 June from 1-4pm, from 6pm | $195 per person
Rottnest has a new reason to stay the night. Sunsets Bar and Dining at The Lodge Wadjemup launches Island Cellar Series this month, a new series pairing West Australian produce with wines worth travelling for. The inaugural event centres on the newly released Vasse Felix 2024 HEYTESBURY Chardonnay, widely regarded as one of the finest in the label’s history.
Executive Chef Mat Powell has built a five-course menu around the wine, with pairings drawn from across the Vasse Felix range. The setting does its part too: Garden Lake at dusk, open fireplaces, underfloor heating, and the kind of quiet that only an island can offer on a long weekend.
The 2024 HEYTESBURY arrives with considerable fanfare. Ray Jordan awarded it 99 points, calling it a wine of tension, energy and power, and suggesting it may be the finest HEYTESBURY yet. Virginia Willcock, Halliday Winemaker of the Year 2026, has been shaping the Vasse Felix Chardonnay style since 2007, a low-intervention approach using wild yeast fermentation in French oak that helped redefine what Margaret River Chardonnay could be.
Accommodation packages with return ferry transfers also available. Book through Sunsets Bar and Dining or The Lodge Wadjemup website.