East meets west at this suburban bowls club – with delicious, wallet-friendly results

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On Wednesdays, the queue for the bistro at the Doubleview Bowling Club often starts forming before the kitchen opens at 5.30pm.

For some, getting in line early is a matter of convenience. Maybe they’re on the way home from the office or school pick-up. Maybe they’re on the way out somewhere. Or maybe the bowlo is exactly where they’re supposed to be because they’ve got a must-win four-a-side community bowls game that evening and need to be ready to roll at 7pm.

For others, this early mealtime is simply good old-fashioned FOMO.

As your correspondent can attest to, Wednesday and Friday night late-comers to this community hub in hilly Doubleview run the risk of missing out on that day’s chalkboard specials.

Perhaps there’ll be two lines of pink chalk through the char siu chicken Maryland served with rice and Asian greens ($25): a meal a pal texted me about and described as “would not have looked out of place at any top restaurant”.

If you’re unlucky, you’ll be in line as the final serve of thick-sliced roast oyster blade and garlic prawns ($25) gets picked up by its lucky owner; have just enough time to wonder what could have been; then watch helplessly as it disappears into the jumble of tables that populate the club’s sprawling hall.

In your head, you hear the immortal (paraphrased) words of the Seinfeld universe’s most famous chef: no reef and beef for you!

Of course, bowlo kitchens running out of food isn’t something to write home about. What is unexpected, however, is the breadth of flavours and influences in play at the Doubleview Bowling Club.

Sure, one could reasonably expect to find roast chook ($25), roast beef and other classic Australiana on offer, but Japanese curry? Regional northern Malaysian noodles? Indonesian grilled beef? These aren’t the bowlo meals our grandparents ate.

But then again, they didn’t have Anisha Halik and Jacob D’Vauz cooking them dinner either.

For the past year, this hospo couple have been quietly running the kitchen at the Doubleview Bowling Club. If the name Jacob D’Vauz sounds familiar, then you’re probably someone that tracks restaurants news closer than most. Or maybe you worked with D’Vauz at Rockpool, Madalena’s, Uncle Joe’s Mess Hall or one of the many places he’s cooked at over the past 15 years?

If so, you’ll know that old mate isn’t shy when it comes to dishing out flavour in his cooking.

But even if you weren’t aware of the D’Vauz origin story, one forkful of our man’s pappardelle ragu ($25; craggy noodles in a deep ragu of beef short rib) lets you know that D’Vauz feels completely at home in a kitchen.

The char siu chook might have eluded me, but its vego counterpart with grilled eggplant ($20) glazed with maltose, fermented soy and honey afforded me a similar contact high.

While the five-dish menu changes weekly, the double cheeseburger ($20) is one of two permanent items and understandably so: it’s a banger. The patties are made with mince from cult Balcatta butcher Troy’s Meats, while lettuce, onion and tomato help freshen things up. Ever wondered what would happen if Macca’s and HJs teamed up Marvel-Capcom style and combined the cheeseburger and Whopper? Wonder no more.

The burger also comes with some of the greatest traditional chips I’ve eaten in Perth. Chubby, brittle and crunchy on the outside and airy inside, they’re the pale yellow nubbins of fried potato we all dream of seeing when we unwrap our parcels of fish and chips. Big-up yourself, Anisha.

A graphic designer by training, Halik is deep in the fish and chips game (a decade at Landsdale Fish and Chips; four years as the opening manager at the Sealanes fish and chipper) and it shows.

As she tells it, frying chips isn’t rocket science: you get a good product, don’t put too much of it in the fryer, then wait for the oil (changed regularly) to come to temperature before cooking. But like so many things in life, there’s a difference between someone that knows how to do something, and someone that has the discipline to sweat all the details.

The fish and chips ($23) is the other menu mainstay and also Halik’s domain. It is, unsurprisingly, also great and the giant plinths of fried fish (usually barramundi) are juicy, golden and crunchy everywhere they ought to be. In this instance, Halik is less forthcoming with details. She’s the only person that makes the batter and not even hubby knows the recipe. Of the 220-ish meals the kitchen serves each night, the fish-and-chips is, again unsurprisingly, a consistent performer.

While dinner at Doubleview Bowling Club plays out like most suburban bowlos – guests collect cutlery and clear their own plates; buzzers let you know to collect your meal – there are signs that management are across wider food and drink trends. Tables can be booked online. The bar sells zeitgeisty craft beers, orange wines and cocktails (pornstar martinis!) at very sharp bowlo prices. A pre-batched Negroni will set you back $12. If you’re a member, you pay even less. At a time when money is tight for so many, dollars saved matter. Not just for eaters, but for hospitality business owners too.

“How do you make a small fortune in hospitality? Start with a big fortune.”

So goes the classic gallows humour of those in the food game.

Right now, it feels like that game is extra challenging, with reduced spending and staff shortages two comments I’m hearing regularly from operators. But despite the current climate, venues continue to open.

While everyone is entitled to roll the dice and chase dreams, I just wonder if now’s the time to open something. Or at least something that follows the traditional path of dropping six figures on building, fit-out, staff, marketing et al and opening the doors saddled with crazy debt.

Why not think and do differently?

Perth’s cafes often lay dormant at night: wouldn’t it be great to see some nocturnal movements in those kitchens? I’ve always thought the Japanese model of two businesses sharing the one space would fly here: legendary Kyoto sake bar Yoramu is, by day, the excellent handmade soba shop, Toru.

Or why not, as Halik and D’Vauz have done, take over a bowlo kitchen?

Of course, cooks serving delicious things at bowls clubs isn’t new in Perth. Local burger successes Bad Love Burger Co and Hoodburger started as pop-ups at the Bayswater Bowling & Recreation Club. (“Pop-ups built Hoodburger,” says co-founder Matt Shaw. “I don’t think anyone expected the bowls club to get as big as it did.“)

The takeovers and queues at Innaloo Sportsmen Club, meanwhile, were instrumental in establishing the legend of Big Don’s Smoked Meats. “I never saw a better vibe for my barbecue than a daggy old Aussie bowlo with $8 pints,” says Big Don’s founder Donovan Macdonald. “If I could buy or lease a big bowling club, I’d ditch my warehouse and go back to one in a heartbeat.”

In both these instances, bowls clubs gave operators a chance to test proof-of-concept before taking the plunge and opening permanent places.

But in the case of D’Vauz and Halik, they’ve reversed the polarity. After all, here’s a couple that came from traditional hospitality backgrounds switching tack and doing something, well, weird. But weird can also mean winning. For everyone.

Diners get delicious, high-calibre cooking at an accessible price (nothing on the menu is more than $25). The club wins, too, as more diners equals more money spent across the bar. And best of all, D’Vauz and Halik – and their young daughter Naia – get a life together. Something of a rarity in the hospo game. The couple are only in service two nights each week and, financially, in a much better position than previously in their careers.

“Honestly, there’s no way I could afford a mortgage plus support my young family on a chef’s income in the traditional restaurant model,” says D’Vauz.

“It just wouldn’t work. This works. This model works for me and my family.”