This is Brisbane’s underworld. When I arrived in Brisbane in 1971, the bar was full of shipbuilders, Vietnam vets and bikies. Built in 1886, the pub was originally called the Logan Hotel after Captain Patrick Logan, the tyrannical commandant of the penal colony of Moreton Bay who was ­accused of cruelty and later murdered by Aborigines. It is said Logan did not spare the whip on convict gangs he invited to quarry the Kangaroo Point cliffs to gather stone for buildings such as the Commissariat Store in the CBD and the Old Windmill on Wickham Terrace, Spring Hill.

Kangaroo Point reeks of history. I ­like to travel by ferry and stroll through the park along the river to the point where there is a sandy beach at low tide. When Evans Deakin ran the shipbuilding yard around the bend, it was like a tiny bit of Glasgow plonked down in Australia. These days it has been transformed into a fine residential suburb.

The pub was reputedly the first in Queensland to offer counter meals. Now there are burgers and tapas. We ate at Deery’s Restaurant and Smokehouse, a handsome, wood-panelled room that has gone up a notch or two with the arrival of a new chef, Miki Damjanovic. There is a choice of beer-battered barramundi ($27) or fish of the day (snapper on the day we ate, market price), ­herbed gnocchi, spatchcock with truffle mash, lamb rack, and “besmoke” mains such as a pork cutlet with honey-glazed pear, kipfler potatoes, crackling, jus and herbs ($32).

Deery’s has a signature beef menu that includes a Rangers Valley Black Onyx rump from northern NSW (400g, $38) and Tasmanian Cape Grim grass-fed sirloin (350g, $40). We slurped oysters natural ($33 a dozen) and beer before tucking into richly flavoured beef from John Dee, a Queensland company started by the Hart family in 1939.

I ordered the John Dee “Gold” grain-fed rib fillet ($350g, $39) from the Darling Downs that had 120 days on grain. It came with delicious braised peas, bacon, and baby onions that had served time in the smoking chamber. There was also ­wilted cos lettuce. My companions ate John Dee eye fillet (200g, $36; 300g, $42) with pommes Lyonnaise and grilled feta. The beef came from a herd finished on grain for 80 days at Warwick on the Southern Downs. They raved about it.

A bowl of crispy, beer-battered deep-fried onion rings ($8) made a glorious accompaniment. And the hand-cut chips ($8) were superior to most I have had lately.

This review originally appeared on news.com.au.