Restaurant News

Cook & Norman Trattoria, Flinders

Our restaurant critics' picks of the latest and best eats around the country right now.

By Michael Harden
Our restaurant critics' picks of the latest and best eats around the country right now: Cook & Norman Trattoria, Flinders.
There's no shortage of good dining options on the Mornington Peninsula, particularly for restaurant fans. Pickings are slimmer for those looking for the kind of mid-range place that Melbourne does so well - relaxed, flexible and quality obsessed. Enter Cook & Norman, a new trattoria on Flinders' main drag owned by the folk behind Dromana Estate's restaurant, Terre. Clinton Trevisi and husband-and-wife chef partners Janine and Rowan Herrald take the trattoria brief seriously. The menu keeps it compact (five appetisers, five pasta/risotti, two main courses, four desserts), simple and, where possible, local. Pasta is all handmade and might include a very good, correct spaghetti carbonara (cheese, pepper, yolk, pancetta, definitely no cream) or a chestnut pappardelle tossed with local wild mushrooms, garlic and thyme. The risotto, a prawn, pancetta and pea number, is expertly cooked and there are good versions of classics such as carpaccio, vitello tonnato, panna cotta and tiramisù. Add a cute little one-page wine list, a well-priced mix of Mornington Peninsula and Italian labels, and a simply outfitted, light-splashed room and it's no wonder locals and blow-ins alike are already flocking.
Cook & Norman Trattoria, shop 1, 52 Cook St, Flinders, Vic, (03) 5989 0119
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