Q Seafood Providore

THEY say a change is as good as a holiday but what do they say about visiting a favourite holiday spot only to find that everything has changed?

Not so long ago, Queenscliff's harbour was a benignly neglected backwater, where small-time boaties could snare a dry-stack berth for a song and kids dangled fishing lines off the rickety pontoons.

But a recent visit revealed the quaint old wharf had been turned into a slick tourist hub, complete with swank boardwalk, shiny shopfronts and, most shockingly, a monolithic observation tower that looked as if it might fire laser beams at any errant child who dared to stray too close to the luxury yachts.

A humble tinnie would have looked as out of place in this picture as a rowboat in the desert.

Speaking of deserts, seaside tourist strips are too often culinary wastelands and there's little about the made-over harbour's clean-lined concrete and glass structures to suggest it would be any different. Yet at least one place seriously delivers the goods.

Q Seafood Provedore looks like an upper-crust food store with a sideline in prepared seafood. Shelves of imported gourmet produce such as Japanese roasted seaweed, Spanish paella rice and Lebanese rosewater fill the shop floor, while glass display cabinets bulge with fresh fish, shellfish, smallgoods and fine cheeses.

There are tables outside but only a couple inside to indicate it's also a sit-down affair, even though the kitchen pumps out seafood that is both exceptionally fresh and inventive.

The menu comprises a few changing specials and a dozen or so "rations" — tapas-style bites that are in fact more of a meal than a mouthful.

Seafood gumbo, for example, is a deep bowl of spicy, tomatoey soup filled with fish pieces, shrimp, root vegetables and sliced jalapenos. A fistful of fresh coriander and two pieces of grilled Zeally Bay sourdough drizzled with excellent olive oil make it perfect comfort fare.

A scallop pie is a stout, stolid-looking thing but slice it open and a brace of dainty scallops and a lush, buttery veloute oozes on to the plate. Delectable.

The classic French technique comes courtesy of chef Stephan McGlynn, who has previously worked in France, in Ireland as a "chef to the stars", in his own restaurant in Vietnam and, most recently, at Torquay cafe Growlers.

Elsewhere, chargrilled calamari is served with a superb salsa of tomato, rocket, red onion, thyme, balsamic vinegar, olive oil and a whisper of chilli, while two fried swimmer-crab cakes come with a fine house-made prawn mayonnaise with a hint of sweetness and more of that fine salsa.

Given the seating shortage, peak periods can lead diners to scrap like seagulls over hot chips, so be prepared to wait for a perch.

Those who still favour battered gummy shark over gumbo — your children, perhaps — are welcome to order from the more conventional Q Fish and Chippery further along the wharf and bring it back in. The two are part of the same business.

Yep, things have changed down at the old wharf — but this time it actually improved my holiday.