Memory can be a funny thing when it comes to restaurants. Before we left Brisbane for Hong Kong, Deer Duck Bistro was one of those places we visited a few times and always left thinking, yeah, that was pretty good. It had this quirky charm, eclectic without being chaotic, and it sat quietly in that space between “special occasion” and “hidden gem.” Coming back more than ten years later, I wasn’t even sure it still existed.

Brisbane’s dining scene has changed a lot in the decade we’ve been gone, and restaurants that once felt permanent have either reinvented themselves or disappeared entirely.

So walking up to Deer Duck again felt like running into an old friend you’re not sure you recognise anymore…. familiar, but noticeably different. A fire early in 2024 forced a major renovation, and the restaurant has since expanded significantly. What used to be a cramped, eccentric little space is now much larger, more refined, and, honestly, much cooler.

The bar is a proper bar now, the kind you’d happily sit at for a cocktail even without a booking. One entire wall is lined with wine, floor to ceiling, and the effect is a bit like walking into a boutique cellar that has somehow become a dining room. The eclectic spirit is still there, but now with polish.

The kitchen is currently steered by… well, that’s the thing. It’s not actually clear who is leading it anymore. The restaurant still presents itself as a classically European, fine‑dining establishment — French technique, traditional tasting‑menu structure, the usual pedigree. And in fairness, ambition isn’t the problem here.

After digging around, it seems Chef Enzo Ninivaggi had been the head chef up until May this year, fresh off a sold‑out collaboration with Stefano Spataro of Elementi in Paddington. Shortly after that event, Enzo appears to have moved over to Elementi permanently, which may explain why our meal didn’t quite hit the standard we expected (more on this soon).

Trying to figure out who took over after Enzo was a surprisingly difficult task. I ended up down a handful of rabbit holes and came up mostly empty‑handed. No clear successor, no updated listings, no announcements. And honestly, this lack of clarity became more and more telling as the dishes arrived.

When we arrived for dinner, the room was quiet, almost surprisingly so, but it filled up quickly. The service team were excellent from the start! Warm, attentive, and the kind of friendly that feels genuine rather than rehearsed. They checked in after every course, and you could tell they cared about how the night was landing for each table. If anything, the service ended up highlighting the food in a way that wasn’t entirely helpful, because the disconnect between the two became more pronounced as the menu rolled on.

The tasting menu sits at $169 per person, which is (alarmingly) about standard for Brisbane these days, but expectations rise quickly at that price point. And from the Amuse Bouche onward, it was clear this wasn’t going to be the Deer Duck we remembered.

The opening bite was undeniably pretty but texturally confusing, too much creamy substance (I know, very technical on my behalf) on the plate, so much so that eating it felt more like navigating terrain than tasting a composed dish. The dried bresaola was, I assume, meant to scoop up the cream, but the whole thing really needed a spoon and the balance of the dish was wildly off. Pretty isn’t enough when the mechanics don’t work.

The Spanner crab, crushed peas with crème fraîche, lemon zest, tapioca cracker didn’t help the momentum. Rustic is one thing, but this leaned toward clumsy. Visually it lacked appeal, and the portion of crab was so minimal that the dish ate more like mushy peas with a cracker than anything resembling a crab dish. When the name of the dish carries the star ingredient, you really want that ingredient to actually be present.

The Pan seared Darling Downs quail, asparagus tagliatelle, soubise, lemon dressing continued the rustic theme, but again, not in a way that felt intentional. My quail breast was overcooked and edging toward dry (the girl’s was better), and the plating didn’t communicate elegance or clarity. The soubise sauce was watery and lacked flavour, and the asparagus, delicate but shapeless, was so lost on the plate that we wouldn’t have known it was there until the tell‑tale asparagus aftermath in the bathroom several hours later.

A watermelon gazpacho followed, and it was fine… refreshing enough, but simple to the point of being one-note. More watermelon drink than dish: In fact, after spearing the watermelon squares, I just drank the ‘soup’ from the bowl and it tasted only of watermelon juice with none of the complexity expected from a gazpacho.

The gnocchi, beetroot purée, beetroot écrasé, pomegranate, river mint, shaved baby beets, bresaola chip came next, perfectly serviceable but far from memorable. A little stodgy, with a beetroot sauce that never really asserted itself. Ironically, the shaved baby beets on top were the most enjoyable part, but because they were a little dry and distinct from the rest of the dish, they felt very disconnected from the rest of the plate.

The salmon, burnt orange purée, fennel, broad beans, citrus segments was, visually, the best dish of the night. But it also had its problems: Under-seasoned, slightly overcooked, and accompanied by a burnt orange purée that was grainy and harsh. Salmon is forgiving, but a burnt orange purée, less so.

And then came the duck.

It was duck breast with sweet potato purée, cherry jus, bitter leaves & given the name of the restaurant, expectations automatically rise, but this was easily the most disappointing dish of the evening. The plating wasn’t rustic anymore, it was sloppy. The portion of duck was so small that we both thought it looked more like duck tongue than duck breast. With the puree dominating the plate, and so little duck to anchor the flavours, the whole thing felt oddly hollow. When a restaurant literally has “duck” in its name, this is the course you don’t want to miss.

I was so disappointed with this dish, I didn’t take a photo… but the girl did, so I’ve added her photo on this occasion (sorry for the lighting – and yes, those are normal sized cherries for context of the amount of duck on the plate)

Desserts didn’t fully rescue the night, though the final dish was the strongest offering.

The first dessert, pineapple curd with coconut espuma, mint gel, chocolate soil, suffered from textural sameness, too much softness, not enough contrast, and the chocolate soil at the bottom wasn’t substantial enough to break things up. There was no strong flavours at all, and I’d never have picked that its base flavour was pineapple. Bigger chunks of chocolate instead of the shavings for more crunch, or simply more acidity would’ve helped.

The second dessert of chocolate mousse with salted caramel, berry gel, lemon aspen, basil was visually appealing and had clearly defined berry and lemon flavours, but again the balance was off. Too much mousse made each bite feel the same after a few spoonfuls, even though the flavours themselves were pleasant. I’d have liked more caramel and less chocolate mousse to balance it out better.

One consistent theme across the menu was the heavy use of garnish, edible flowers, leaves, herbs. A few is fine. Every plate looking like it fell through a florist? Harder to justify. By the midpoint of the meal I found myself scraping them aside just to understand what the actual components were meant to be.

The irony is that the service team were excellent throughout, and the girl loved her red wine from the Canary Islands, a drop she’d had before and still rates highly. That contrast made the food feel even more uneven, almost jarring at times.

And this is where things became even clearer: the lack of direction in the kitchen showed itself on every plate. The flavours felt unfocused, the plating inconsistent, and the dishes bore little resemblance to the beautifully styled photos on Deer Duck’s website and Instagram: images that clearly showed what these plates were meant to look like.

What arrived at the table felt like a far cry from that intention. It left me wondering whether a less experienced team was now trying to execute someone else’s menu without the technique or confidence to pull it off.

We’ve eaten at a fair number of hatted restaurants since returning, and getting a complete, fully satisfying meal has been harder than expected. Deer Duck offers a lovely setting, warm hospitality, and flashes of ambition.

But for us, on this night, it didn’t quite measure up.