Pavilion is a restaurant located at the West Coast Institute in Joondalup. It is a restaurant where hospitality staff are trained, so it’s best to bear this in mind when attending. Sometimes everything runs perfectly smoothly, and sometimes not so, but everybody has to train somewhere, and this aspect is reflected in the price of the food. I went there for lunch with work colleagues, and the floor was full of eager beaver trainee wait staff who served us admirably, especially young Bella who was assigned to our table.
The menu does not have a massive choice and there is usually only one vegetarian option. The regular choices are 3-4 entrees, mains and desserts. It’s not particularly inventive or masterchef-like, but then again, the objective here is to train wait staff, and to have an over complicated menu would add an extra dimension of difficulty to proceedings. That said, all the food here is very tasty and well prepared.
We ate a set menu for a special staff function. Our starter was a pumpkin and coconut soup. Lovely and smooth, with a bit of a spice kick to it, and perfectly prepared croutons, I enjoyed this very much.
Then we had a ‘go up and serve yourself’ carvery with a choice of pork or lamb. I chose the pork, and the chef served up a slightly clumsily carved thick slice of pork, when a few smaller slices would have been preferable. This was served with apple sauce, potatoes dauphinoise, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, pumpkin, crispy roast potato cubes and gravy. I really enjoyed the food, despite having to cut large chunks off of my ginormous slice of pork. The veggies were a little underdone, but this is probably intentional as carvery vegetable sit around on the heaters for a while (and probably eventually become overdone).
Dessert was a lemon tart or an orange chocolate mousse. The orange chocolate mousse was luscious and very moreish with some wonderful candied nuts on top. The lemon tart was nicely made and served with fruit.
We were offered tea and coffee and the meal was complete. There were a few ‘accidents’ in the dining room, a few dropped glasses, and some service mistakes here and there, but generally it was a very pleasant meal and the staff tried very hard to ensure that we had everything that we needed.
If you are happy to be served by young trainees, and don’t mind that the service is a little slow and deliberate at times, you will end up having quite a good value delicious meal. The trainees are really enthusiastic and pleasant to chat to. If you are looking for silver service and perfection, then look elsewhere. I liked it, and would be happy to return.
Visit Date – March 2018
Truly Scrumptious 
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