Madalena's (Fremantle)
One of our favourite wine bars which specialise in seafood.
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Before reading ❗️
Who is this suited for?
Guests after a wine-bar serving up seasonal and local seafood.
What type of food is available?
Predominantly seafood (cooked and raw).
What should I order?
Their menu here changes often. Some of our favourites from the past two visits include their: tuna tartare with sourdough crisps and their Wagin duck liver parfait.
How much will it cost?
Most dishes range from around $16 - $40. Some dishes are priced according to the market price of the fish.
Can I see the menu?
You can find Madalena's menu here.
Where is it?
In South Freo, near Little Loaf / Run Amuk / Sanco.
The details 📝
We've spent our fair bit of time working at Nobu. When we worked here, we were fortunate enough to meet Nobu-san himself. We were also fortunate enough to sample lots of delicious seafood. Delicious seafood, quite often. This would eventually be the biggest curse and blessing - it set our standard for Japanese food, seafood and dining in general, to a higher level. There are lots of Nobu copies in Perth, cause let's face it - Japanese cuisine has always been popular (can be attributed to Cool Japan), and "contemporary" or "modern" Japanese popularised by the man himself is here to stay.
Anyway, we digress and we ramble. As lovers of seafood, Madalena's is one of the places we love going to. We find their take on seafood refreshing - no copycat "Nobu" influence that we're used to seeing (okay, maybe some Asian influence, but that's everywhere these days).
Joel Rees and Danielle Christina de Almeida, the couple behind Madalenas, previously ran number of eateries including a Brazilian food truck and a pop-up South American and Asian-style street-food eatery. The couple eventually set up shop in south Freo. In April 2022, they officially opened their upstairs bar space.
Madalena's features a walk-in upstairs bar and a restaurant located on the bottom floor. Note that the upstairs bar menu differs slightly to the restaurant menu. The menu is divided up with a number of raw and cooked seafood options and changes often. The best in seasonal seafood is sourced exclusively from their partner, Fins Seafood (nice pun). You can see some of their previous culinary experience rub off on certain dishes - like the ceviche (Peruvian) and ingredients like longan and Thai basil.
We dined with a group of five and ordered around seven dishes and a bottle of wine. To start - the Rowley Shoals ama ebi. Sweet and creamy are the descriptors used for this - with the sweetness coming from the ama ebi and longan. Your palate is coated with fatty and creamy goodness from the avocado and the ama ebi to an extent. Being a ceviche, it had a little bit of heat to it.
The scallops were sweet. Thai basil added a herbacious quality to the dish while the sesame added some texture.
The tuna tartare with the addition of the glorious egg yolk , was decadently rich and creamy. It balanced out well texturally, with the brunchy sourdough crisps and celery.
A favourite from our first visit was the Wagin duck liver parfait. Again, a fairly rich, creamy and butter dish. Sweetness came from the vermouth jelly and perfectly rendered and punchy onion jam. Shout out to the runner who procured us an extra slice of bread too! ❤️
The remaining dishes we ordered were of the "cooked" variety. The toothfish was fatty and creamy. We loved the sauce at the bottom which was refreshing and almost chimichurri like.
As a "carb" we opted for two serves of the frites. Be sure to enjoy the aioli on the side as well (and always ask for extra aioli!).
The chamomile butter was fragrant and was soaked up by the red emperor. Lemon added a slight zest and cut through the rich butter.
Our least favourite dish was the squid despite it being still very tender. Flavours felt very "Thai" on this one, maybe as a result of the basil and fried shallots.
Before visiting 🚙
Anything else I should know before visiting?
- Be sure to book ahead of your visit!
- Larger eaters might want to grab the fries and / or house sourdough.
What's the address?
Where do I park?
Free street parking is available on adjacent streets (e.g. Hickory St and Walker St).
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