Castlemaine and Daylesford Part 1

After reading about Steph's adventures in castlemaine, I bookmarked it and decided that I had to go there. We went away for a weekend and stayed at the incredibly tranquil accommodation just outside of castlemaine. And first stop for food was saffs of course.

We had dinner there on the first night and were pleased to get a table near the fireplace. I ordered the chickpea curry which comes with rice and banana. The curry was nicely spiced and perfect for a nice winter night. I loved the banana, it had a great cooling effect.
Toby had the dhal burger with fries which he said was good but was lacking some sauce because he ordered it without yogurt. So he added in some tomato sauce.

We went back for breakfast and had the vegan and gluten free breakfast, although Toby added some toast to his:
I really liked the crunchy potato rosti and was so pleased to have a vegan and gluten free breakfast option, but Toby wasn't overly impressed with the meals or the coffee, he was particularly annoyed by the lack of protein and I had to remind him that we were in fact in the country and not some hip cafe in fitzroy.

Saff's cafe
43 Mostyn St
Castlemaine

While in castlemaine, I checked out the IGA around the corner from saffs and was super impressed they had an amazing selection of vegan/gluten free things that I hadn't even seen before including soups, dips and even a vegan and gluten free lasagna. I just kept walking around saying 'I love this place', next time we might stock up and have some meals back at our accommodation.

We always seem to go away to daylesford, and while this time we stayed in castlemaine we couldn't resist going to daylesford since it's only about 30 minutes away. I was a little worried about our trip to himalaya bakery since my last trip there was pretty gluten heavy but was relieved to discover that they had gluten free bread and loads of gluten free options including 2 muffins which were both vegan and gluten free. For lunch Toby had the open sandwich with white bean dip, grilled capsicum, lettuce over toast. He was surprised to find the white bean dip was actually cold but thought the flavours were lovely and fresh.


I had the white bean dip with g/f toast and tomato and spinach. I enjoyed the addition of onion and herbs to this dish, it was really was much tastier than it sounds.


We went back for breaky the next day, toby had the mushroom scrambled tofu with extra potatoes. Toby thought it was full of flavour and filling but a little oily.
I had the spanish scrambled tofu with had capsicum, tomato and gluten free toast. I really enjoyed this and was so grateful for finally finding a g/f scrambled tofu dish, toby agreed that it was a tad tastier than his.

Himalaya Bakery
73 Vincent St Daylesford

And of course no trip to the region would be complete without a trip to continental house for the vegan banquet which is on sat evenings.

It started with the nourishing soup which contained pumpkin, seaweed, buckwheat. I'm not normally into healthy soups but I loved it.

For mains there was a selection of raw and cooked dishes, most of which were gluten free. They even had a gluten free lasagna which I think was more like a bake since it contained bread crumbs on top instead of a cheesy sauce but was our favourite dish of the night. I also really enjoyed the raw pad thai, and the tofu dish. Both of us were incredibly full and happy at the end of this meal, so full that I forgot to take a picture of dessert which was a bowl of fruit.


Continental House
9 Lone Pine Ave
Hepburn Springs
www

But that's not it, Toby will wrap up the rest of our eating and drinking adventures away in the next post.