First Look: Carlton North’s Kent Hotel Feels Like a Pub Again

In August 2024, when chef Adrian Richardson closed La Luna – the 25-year-old bistro known for its house-aged beef – he left Rathdowne Village in want of a steak spot.

A few months later, Chris Gray (a co-owner of Hardiman’s Hotel in Kensington) began considering taking over the Kent Hotel on the corner of Curtain and Rathdowne streets. Noticing the hole left by La Luna’s closure, Gray decided steak would anchor the pub’s next chapter. 

An additional focus for Gray and his co-owners – chef Thomas Payne, Michael Thiele and Mark White – was to change the venue from a restaurant into “a bit more of a pub”, Gray says. 

The group took over the heritage-listed Victorian-era pub, which dates back to 1870, in April last year and undertook a light renovation. Downstairs is meant to feel like “an old traditional pub”, Gray says. The dining room sits at the back of the venue and, at the front, there’s now a public bar complete with TVs and high-top tables. 

Two upstairs rooms have been “opened up, brightened up and made a little bit more airy”. They will be used for private events and overflow on busy nights, as well as for pub programming such as monthly comedy nights and tastings with local winemakers. There’s also a new, peach-coloured outdoor terrace on the second floor with room for around 35. 

True to Gray’s vision, steak is centrestage here. Meat is dry-aged on-site, with nine cuts available including club steak, rib eye and a 1.2-kilogram tomahawk. Each is served with hand-cut chips and a choice of pepper sauce, béarnaise, red wine jus, café de Paris butter, or chimichurri.

Payne, who previously worked at Hardiman’s, leads the kitchen. In addition to steak, his menu is made up of pub classics like beer-battered fish’n’chips, roast chicken and a cheeseburger and chips with CWA-style tomato relish. Dessert includes hot apple pie with ice-cream; and a coconut sorbet with finger lime and pineapple-and-spiced-rum compote.

To drink, there are 10 beers on tap, and a 400-bottle wine list that leans local, with some old-world drops rounding out the offering. 

Additional reporting by Jude Corbet O’Rourke

Kent Hotel
370 Rathdowne Street, Carlton North(03) 7048 0981

Hours:
Sun to Wed midday–10pm
Thu midday–9pm
Fri & Sat midday–midnight

kenthotel.com.au
@kent_hotel