Dining at this new Kyneton French bistro is a bucketful of candelit romance and then some. So it'll  come as little surprise when I tell you the trick to eating here is to take someone you really like.

Here in Kyneton, home to wide-hipped streets, Midnight Starling offers one of the most intimate dining experiences around. We're talking four hours of dim-lit, jazz-backed, finessed French in the cellar. It's an hour-plus drive up the Calder, a Friday or Saturday only deal and $100 or $140 a head. Suffice to say, you wouldn't gamble on a first date with this one.

It's also one of the most accomplished French dining experiences you'll find in Victoria. Once you've adjusted to the intimate space, where the smell of stone hangs thick in the air, you'll find tables double-swathed in linens, and cutlery with serious weight. On plate, chef-owner Steven Rogers goes beyond the coq au vin he serves in the bistro upstairs to deliver five or eight delicate courses where produce is king, and sauce work is all.

Rogers is an expat of the likes of Jacques Reymond and Pierre Gagnaire in Paris and Michelin restaurant training is writ large across his plates. This is basically a masterclass in Escoffier, kept light and local with sparks of acid-brightness and home-grown veg.

So it might start with some lightly vinegared garden crunch – capers, cucumbers and zucchini flowers – piled over silky, sweet onion soubise.
Next there's the heirloom-tomatoes-and-cheese combo you can't stop finding in restaurants, but Rogers kicks his up to 11 with a pungent wedge/puddle of Mothais sur Feuille goat's brie from western France. Phwoar.

The beauty of the menu comes less from surprises than from adroit execution. Over and over it's sauce work that sets things on fire. We're sent prawns and tiny, tender curls of squid, lightly grilled and still sticky, electrified by a shellfish broth that's all concentrated fresh prawn shell flavour.

See also a tranche of roasted hapuku and zucchini tinier than Trump's fingers robed in a textbook, buttery champagne sauce.

The balance is athletic, made all the more impressive by the fact that Rogers is working solo in the kitchen save for a dishie.

It bears noting we're the sole diners in the dungeon on the night in question, if only because it underscores ex-MoVida floor manager Daniel Saligari can handle a room. An empty one is a tough gig.

Do we like the jazz? We do, but he gives us the choice to switch to obscure French punk. It's also so often Saligari's wine matches that are the sucker punch to dinner.

With that tomato salad it's a minerally Clos des Briords from Muscadet in Loire, knocking the sting out of that amazingly rank cheese.

The bright crunch of Dr Loosen riesling high fives the prawns hard and later, when you've reached the dark night of dinner – plush purple slices of seared venison, lolling over roasted rhubarb, boozed-up cherries and a resinous jus – there's pinot noir from Shadowfax to hold hands with the spices.

It's service that makes you glad sharp operators get jack of the city.

Speaking of running away to towns, you can have a cracker of a bourgeois weekend. You've missed the Lost Trades Fair, where salty blacksmiths and coopers mill around, wielding tools, but markets abound, as do sausage classes at the Piper Street Food Co. It's as magical as your dessert, feather-light pastry sandwiching a creamy vanilla sabayon and chocolate mousse with those teensy alpine strawberries that taste like grape candy.

What a trip. Take the ride.