George Calombaris’s latest venture in Williamstown isn’t the place where you’d stop by for a pint and parma after work with your mates. There are no TVs, no outdoor seating, and only three uncomfortable stools at the bar, so it’s barely a pub at all. But if you’re after a workday lunch, a school-night feed for the family or a couple of glasses of wine with your favourite grown-ups, Hellenic Hotel has got you wrapped up like a souva.
The building is divided into a large downstairs restaurant where you’ll probably want to book, and a small upstairs bar with high tables for social drinking. This is touted as the “pub” part, with beer on tap and cheap, pub classic specials (a different one every day) that you won’t find on the restaurant menu. Everything on a plate of fish and chips is outstanding from the golden fries, impossibly even in hue, to the lightly battered flathead tails, to the tartare-tzatziki hybrid sauce threaded with fresh dill. This would be a cracker lunch, but the portion size is too small for a dinnertime pub appetite. A single spoonful of neon green (and bloody tasty) mushy peas is so small it’s easily mistaken for a dollop of condiment. Same goes for the souvlakia – delicious but probably not enough to constitute dinner. A tender and herb-roasted half chook might tide you over, but you’d need at least one side to make a meal of it, taking you close to $30 for a proper feed.
Up here, better off sticking to a pint of Two Birds Golden Ale or a ‘Ptoma’ - thei