Gone Bananas Restaurant - 87 Davidson St, Port Douglas. Ph:     07 4099 5400    

Gone Bananas Restaurant Port Douglas describe their cuisine as MediterrAsian. No, the Bananas’ food fiends aren’t mad, just very creative, and they’ve found a way to concoct a menu that combines the best of the best immigrant flavours. Multiculturalism is a very tasty word in this restaurant. What’s more, the barramundi have wings.

They used to call it Going Bananas and it was cherished by locals as one of their favourite hangouts. These days, having actually gone bananas, it’s a more refined but still popular haunt.

Easy to see why, because Gone Bananas is very welcoming and once inside you are cocooned beneath a tropical canopy, like some indoor scene from ‘South Pacific’, minus the pesky marines.

Whilst there are fab pasta dishes, including a lovely yabbi spaghetti amongst the entrées, I was drawn to the water buffalo. The meat has something of the feel of kangaroo and, served rare in medallions, has a gorgeous ‘creamy’ texture and a slightly gamey flavour. An exotic and sumptuous beginning indeed. Quite sexy actually.

Though I was tempted by the crocodile curry, I went for a Gone Bananas signature dish, the MediterrAsian marinara. Here you get Italian methodology with Asian ingredients; and it works brilliantly as the calamari, scallops, prawns, mussels and fish mingle atop Japanese noodles. Binding it all together, a homemade kaffir lime, lemongrass, chilli and galangal infused oil.

Next up, it was time for the English/Indian combo of the Banoffi pie, a baked banana and caramel confection that finished things off beautifully. Topped with a light macadamia and coconut crumble and served with coconut icecream, it’s a dessert that plays to both traditional and adventurous palates. (I must confess that I also tried the outrageously addictive chocolate brownie too and, yeah … wow.)

Of course, there’s a lot more to the dining experience at Gone Bananas than food. Not only do they serve fabulous dessert cocktails with names like Sex and Marlon Brando but they have a hand picked cellar selection of cracking good wines and champagnes at prices that won’t empty your piggy bank.

However, in closing, I must mention the outrageous rocket & caramelised pear salad with crushed nuts and blue cheese. It’s probably a bit sad to leave a restaurant raving about the salad, but honestly, this was exceptional. If all salad was this good I’d stop exercising.

PS: As for the ‘flying’ barramundi, it’s a Bananas’ specialty, not a freak of nature. Seriously.

Gone Bananas Restaurant Port Douglas

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