Many Little adds bar and bistro flair to Red Hill on the Mornington Peninsula

Many Little is yet another feather in Mornington Peninsula winemaker Sam Coverdale’s cap and brings wine bar flair with bistro hits to Red Hill, writes Dan Stock.

Dan Stock

@dantonstock

3 min read

January 28, 2019 - 3:42PM

The bone-in veal schnitzel is an updated version of a bistro classic executed with class.

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If you want something done, ask a busy person.

So goes the saying and given that, I reckon Sam Coverdale must be deftly dealing with more competing requests than Tony Jones on a Monday night.

The Red Hill winemaker — who got his start as a cellar hand at Tyrell’s in the Hunter Valley — along with wife Emma Phillips has two wine labels (Even Keel, Polperro), one of the most handsome winery dining rooms on the Mornington Peninsula (Polperro), a handful of luxury accommodation suites, a hot yoga studio, a clothing boutique (Amelie & Franks) and, coming in March, a three-bedroom farmhouse for guest accommodation.

I’m exhausted just writing them all.

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And to that list comes Many Little, a bistro/wine bar smack bang in the heart of Red Hill village that opened just before the very silly season that is the two weeks of summer holidays down on the peninsula.

The Tuna Tataki — like all dishes — is presented on lovely crockery

A more relaxed, casual sibling to Polperro — which remains one of my favourite spots down here for vine dining — Many Little is a day-through-after dark offering that will, from this weekend, start with eggs and coffee before seguing into entree-main lunch and dinner and three-cheese toasties late at the bar.

This night, the dappled light of the towering gums makes the large courtyard area in the small shopping strip a perfectly lovely spot for the early evening, while inside you’ll find a fetching dining room with the signature smart, clean-lined design of Hecker Guthrie (lots of tan, wood and earthy hues juxtaposed with industrial chic metal-and-timber chairs). There’s a separate bar and wine-for-home bottle-o, with stools surrounding the former both inside and out on the deck.

This take on bolognese is homely but ultimately forgettable

It’s a lovely space that hides its almost 200-seat capacity like a Tardis, though I’d imagine staff might struggle with an at-capacity crowd.

I’m all for summer holiday jobs — we all had and needed one, after all — but the young team tonight seemed to lack a strong, steady pair of hands in charge that can wrangle, help and teach the less-experienced. I reckon they’ll get there — a couple of how-to-use-a-corkscrew lessons took place in front of us, though wines by the glass are poured at the table — but for now a little bit of patience is needed.

Dusk drinks out on the deck are always a good idea.

The menu is a continent-jumping collection of bistro-ish hits that sound like the type of things you want to eat after a day at the beach — DIY tempura barramundi tacos; whole-roasted flat head with caper butter sauce; a daily changing pot pie; crab linguine — with a good showing of plates from the garden.

That linguine, for instance, is perfectly summer holiday. Fresh and vibrant, the supple pasta strands come tossed through roasted cherry tomatoes that burst with sunshiny acid, sweet crab with a hit of chilli heat and the polarising dice of lemon rind that some will find too assertive ($19/$34).

It comes, as does everything, on gorgeous crockery that does its level best to steal the show (though the napkin supporting act is, sadly, a talentless understudy to the cloth original).

Tuna tataki — just seared, rolled in white and black sesame and served rare — comes hidden under dried tuna flakes (katsuobushi) and with a citrus and garlic oil dressing for a plate of elegant salty goodness ($18).

Spaghetti bolognese “Many Little style” is a rustic ragu of minced beef with veg that 14 hours of slow cooking left surprisingly bland. While it needed more salt (none provided) it was homely in the perfectly forgettable way of a thousand spag bols that preceded it ($26).

The on-the-bone veal schnitzel, however, is a winner. Along with a little pile of pickled red cabbage “sauerkraut” and a terrific pomegranate chutney, the beautifully blushing pink meat comes rocking a deep tan crumb crust ($34) that sings with a spritz of the charred lime alongside.

Many Little’s handsome dining room. Picture Rebecca Michael.

From the garden, the sticky soft eggplant cooked into submission and drizzled with a sweet miso caramel ($12) was the pick over the Middle Eastern-channelling turmeric-roasted cauliflower that suffered the dual ignominy of too much preserved lemon and being served on cold cauliflower puree ($14). Resolutions be damned, I’ll go for the beer battered, garlic buttered chips next time instead.

The bar, of course, is a vertically integrated selection of Coverdale’s wines — including his terrific bracingly quenching Even Keel cortese, $15 glass — along with judicious showing of other Victorians cast with a winemaker’s eye for interest, while a focus on gins and vermouth keeps tabs on Melbourne drink trends.

And I reckon those in the area — full timers and weekenders alike — will rejoice at having a bar with such good booze to prop up. Busy people need somewhere to take a load off, after all.