By TANIA PHILLIPS
THE Ivory Palms Resort’s restaurant has a new name, a new look and a new focus.
Now called PK’s Cafe and Bar, the restaurant is catering heavily to families – the resort’s target market – leading the way with beautiful wood-fired pizzas, perfect for locals and visitors.
“The Ivory Palms Resort has 130 apartments and for many years we have had the Palms Restaurant and Bar,” owner and resort manager Geoff Hussin said.
“But it didn’t really hit the family market the way we wanted to.
“Breakfasts were going really really well through the week.”
However dinner was not attracting the families that the Ivory Palms was famous for.
And so Geoff said it was decided to give the restaurant a new name and a major make-over, including major extensions.
The new name reflects the family feeling of the whole resort.
“It’s now PK’s Cafe and Bar,” he said.
“It’s short for Pretty Katelyn. When our daughter was young I use to call her Pretty Katelyn and my wife would call her Precious Katelyn.”
The couple eventually shortened their nicknames for their daughter to PK and the name stuck.
PK’s menu has also undergone some renovations as well – and it took some pretty heavy lifting to do it.
“We craned in an Italian wood-fired pizza oven,” Geoff said.
“The oven weighs two tonnes – we had to get builders to create a Besser block bench to hold it.”
The oven caused a stir when it flew into place and is now still causing a stir, with the restaurant producing beautiful wood-fired delights.
The restaurant is now open to locals to enjoy wood-fired pizza and popular beers on tap on Friday and Saturday nights.
But Geoff and his family have plans to increase that down the track, adding in Sunday afternoons – hopefully during the warmer months.
“It’s all baby steps at the moment,” he said.
“But I’m talking to a local singer at the moment – and adding some chilled-out acoustic music too.”
As well as expanding the restaurant, PK’s will be expanding their staff.
Geoff said they needed two cooks outside with the pizza oven, and someone in the kitchen making the kids’ pizzas and would be looking to advertise in the next week or so.
He said he hoped that locals would come along and enjoy the food and get to know the restaurant.
Find PK’s Cafe and Bar at the Ivory Palms Resort Noosaville, phone 5473 1700. Open Wednesday to Sunday for dinners during holidays or Fridays and Saturday the rest of the year. They open for drinks at 4pm, pizza from 6pm until 8pm-9pm.
