Max's at Red Hill Estate

From this unfussy, many-windowed dining room set high on the ridge of Red Hill, the views are outstanding, in fact, some of the peninsula's best. Diners in groups and pairs form a content crowd, happily ordering the succulent honey-and-thyme roasted quail with baked fig and buttery local blue cheese, and matching it with a crisp estate chardonnay. The robust flavours continue with a terrifically crisp-skinned duck breast, or a pink-centred lamb fillet crusted in dukkah and plated with rustic pea mash. A citrus-curd dessert may look spectacular, with its garland of meringues, but it may fail to work on the palate - tipping to too-sweet. Zabaglione made with the estate's sparkling is better. Young service can sometimes be unsophisticated, but that view across netting-trussed vines to Western Port and the knobby end of Phillip Island more than compensates.