The Page turns, around the corner

Like a book you can always go back to, so too can I go back to a well-loved suburban steak house which isn’t quite where you’d think. Pagewood Steakhouse (previously in a small premises on Bunnerong Road, Pagewood) has turned the corner and gone further east to a similarly small shop beneath several stacks of apartments. Look out for the bold red font of the sign, or follow your nose on Maroubra Road to the smoky smells of the grill.

Family run and family (and meat) oriented, the menu at Pagewood Steakhouse hasn’t changed for years; neither physically nor the content within. It’s just one of those places where you go for your usual/favourite, and it’s (mostly) always the same. Just a tad noisier in the Maroubra venue.

Side salad from Pagewood Steakhouse, Maroubra Road, Maroubra

Salad arrives as soon as orders are in, in small, dated wooden bowls which I think are also in my kitchen cupboard. Iceberg lettuce props up a single tomato wedge and cucumber slice, grated carrot and in a non-Pagewood addition, it’s fancied-up with a topping of gourmet mixed leaves, all doused with a dressing not unlike supermarket Italian. Every time, I have to force myself not to eat the entire salad before my main meal gets to the table.

We skip entrées this time, remembering the generous serving sizes of the mains (and excuse the incredibly dark, fuzzy, smoky photos). Steaks are all presented and served on hot metal plates which, while theatrical in sight and sound with meal warming capabilities, I think could also contribute to continue to cook a steak while one eats it – perhaps order a bit under what you prefer.

(Left to right, top to bottom)
Rump steak with Mexican sauce, New York steak with pepper sauce and chips,
rump steak with mushroom sauce, sirloin with Provincale sauce

Meat eater 1 has chosen a rump steak with a Mexican sauce, which arrives in fireworks of spitting fat and sizzling smoke. The sauce smothered over the thick steak comprises diced onion, tomato, garlic and is spiked with chilli. As if the warm, smoking plates weren’t already upping the temperature at the table, the Mexican sauce certainly brought on some perspiration.

Meat eater 2’s New York steak comes covered in a creamy pepper sauce and an avalanche of homely thin-cut potato chips. The combination of these chips in one of the creamy sauces (pepper, dianne and mushroom) is extremely naughty, but divinely crave-worthy.

Meat eater 3 opts for a medium-well sirloin, which appears to have been sliced in half for a thinner, faster-cooking steak. The Provincale sauce looks suspiciously like the Mexican but with sweetness replacing spiciness.

My medium-rare rump steak with the creamy mushroom sauce isn’t a sight to behold alongside the foil-wrapped potato, but is my natural choice when I feel I’m allowed to be a bit indulgent. The sauce tastes sweetly tart, likely from a Worcestershire sauce hit, plus heapings of sour cream and sliced button mushrooms. Already a little overcooked on arrival, my steak reaches a medium level by the end due to the aforementioned hot metal plate – but tender and flavoursome nonetheless.

We never fail to leave Pagewood Steakhouse without being stuffed full and smoked out. The only difference this time is that we leave satisfied into the darkness of Maroubra rather than Pagewood.