New team dreams big as it rejigs Tanswell's Hotel in Beechworth

New managers at Tanswell's Hotel in Beechworth want to turn the 159-year-old pub into a beacon of north-east food and wine.

Changes are already evident in the 50-seat dining room and on the menu, which features locally caught and foraged fare cooked over fire.

Harrietville trout smoked on-site and venison cutlets are among the dishes introduced by the four new operators, who include Loti chef Elijah Holland and Discovered Wild Foods founder Billy Staughton, who supplies much of the hotel's meat.

"People are mad for [wild game]," says fellow partner Jed Enslow, who's worked at the pub for many years.

The dining room now features original baltic pine floorboards, whitewashed walls, native blooms and other plants. The public bar, which has been left largely untouched, will serve Milawa chicken pie, burgers with local beef and other counter meals.

Further changes will be introduced from July 4, with dishes such as wild boar 'nduja on crumpets giving Tanswell's one of the most interesting pub menus in Victoria.

"We're probably only 20 per cent of the way through what we want to do," says Enslow.

Work is under way to turn a back room into a casual dining space with a restored horseshoe bar and by summer, they'll have transformed an upstairs ballroom into a 90-seat cocktail bar. They're excavating a cellar, filled in during the 1970s, to house cocktail barrels, mushroom-growing gear and special events.

Duncan Black of commercial kitchen manufacturer Vanrooy rounds out the new team.

Open lunch Fri-Sun noon-3pm, dinner daily 6pm-9pm

50 Ford Street, Beechworth, 03 5728 2151, tanswellshotel.com.au