Favourite local restaurants of top Melbourne chefs and Good Food Guide reviewers
Michael Harry
Photo: Joe Armao
Ben Shewry, Attica
France-Soir is just super consistent, and that s an underrated commodity in restaurants. We focus so much on newness but this place does not vary at all and holds its standard so well. They import a lot of wine and the wines by the glass are excellent. I love the room and watching all the people who come in – you ll see everyone from young couples on a date to people in their 80s just sitting down for dinner at 9pm or 10pm. There s nowhere else in Australia quite like it.
So far this year, my restaurant reviews for the Good Food section of
The Sydney Morning Herald have covered a Vegas-style big-night-out restaurant at Barangaroo with no fewer than four kitchens, a tiny inner-urban pizzeria, a Nigerian home-style kitchen, a breezy wine bar on Sydney’s northern beaches and a roadhouse diner in the Blue Mountains. Next up, Mexican and Japanese.
It’s a similar mix for my fellow reviewer on
The Age, Gemima Cody, who – while in and out of lockdown – has rated a taqueria in Geelong, Andrew McConnell’s glamorous CBD opening, a plant-forward diner in Westgarth, Three Blue Ducks at a Tullamarine surf park and Ben Shewry’s Attica Summer Camp in the Yarra Valley.
The best new express lunch spots in Melbourne s CBD
Michael Harry
Photo: Supplied
Who would have thought that while we were either not allowed or were too afraid to venture to the city, all these fantastic lunch places would have sprung to life?
The city has been working overtime to return to its old self. Many of our favourite pitstops have survived the restrictions rollercoaster and are open and eager for business, but there s also a spate of new venues that have arrived on the CBD landscape. From a three-dish hawker cafe to a polished sandwich and wine bar, these recently opened lunch spots will ease your transition back to city life.
Middle Eastern restaurant Bar Saracen to close in Melbourne s CBD
Roslyn Grundy
Photo: Supplied
Melbourne CBD favourite Bar Saracen has announced it will close on January 30, almost three years after opening.
In a post on Instagram, owner Joseph Abboud (who also owns Rumi and the Moor s Head) said the effects of COVID-19 on trade at the top end of the CBD, including the loss of international guests, city workers and passing foot traffic, had left the restaurant in a precarious financial situation.
When Abboud opened in the Punch Lane site in March 2018 – originally in partnership with front-of-house pro Ari Vlassopoulos – he set out to create an experience more refined than at his 15-year-old Brunswick restaurant Rumi.