Where to eat this weekend in Melbourne and Victoria
AUSTRALIA’s top winery opens a new cellar door in the Yarra Valley and a Fitzroy bar’s been ranked among the world’s best. Meanwhile, there’s free chicken in Maribyrnong and excellent empanadas in Southbank. Food guru Dan Stock helps plan your weekend.
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THERE are world class offerings for those looking for a tipple around Melbourne this weekend.
Seville Estate in the Yarra Valley — recently named Australia’s top winery — opens its new cellar door. Meanwhile, Fitztroy’s Black Pearl has just been recognised among the world’s top handful of bars.
Then there’s free chicken in Melbourne’s north and excellent empanadas in Southbank.
Here are the top picks of where to eat and drink this weekend.
INSIDE THE YARRA VALLEY’S SECRET WINE REGION
BLACK PEARL NAMED BEST BAR IN AUSTRALASIA
FOR AWARD-WINNING WINE
Yarra Valley gold
They’ve just been named the Australian Winery of the Year by the doyen of Australian wine, James Halliday, in his annual wine awards.
The team also took home the trophy for best shiraz and best pinot noir.
Find out what all the fuss is about this weekend when Seville Estate in the Yarra Valley opens its new cellar door and releases the 2017 vintage of its award-winning wines.
It’s not just the swag of trophies that’s proving a drawcard for wine lovers to Seville Estate — though the cellar door boasts some of the most spectacular views across the valley of any — but the new restaurant where a weekly changing menu of local produce is served up in a beautiful Scandi-chic room filled with living greenery.
Crunchy-crusted sourdough cob hot from the oven might precede a vibrant patch of freshly plucked veg dressed in bright, punchy vinegar; terrific radishes with housemade goat’s curd; and gorgeously pan-tanned gnocchi with smoked chicken and tarragon, all matched with estate wines, some of them rare releases only available here. It’s a win for the valley that’s well worth the drive.
Bookings essential for the restaurant; cellar door is open all weekend 10am-5pm
Seville Estate. 65 Linwood Rd, Seville.
FOR CHICKEN AND BEER
There is such thing as a free lunch
This weekend, to celebrate the new Gami Chicken and Beer at Highpoint, the team will be giving away 1000 pieces of chicken across Fri and Sat. It’s the perfect excuse to try the crispy Korean-style fried chicken that’s proven so popular that founder Jun Lee’s first store in Carnegie that opened in 2006 has grown into a chain that’s projected to have 45 stores around the country by 2020.
The new Highpoint store is the first to feature a children’s playground, but like the others will be serving the famous chicken that’s coated in 17 herbs and spices fried crisp, along with the Gami house beer brewed in collaboration with Brunswick’s Thunder Road.
Fried chicken and cold beer. One of life’s simple — greatest — pleasures.
Gami Chicken & Beer, Highpoint Shopping Centre.
FOR A WORLD CLASS DRINK
Shaken and stir
For the second year in a row, Brunswick St’s16-year-old Black Pearl has been named the best bar in Australasia in the prestigious World’s 50 Best Bars awards. Coming in at 30, it’s the only bar in Australia to crack this year’s list — Above Board in Collingwood cracked the secondary top 100, sneaking in at 95 — and proves that bars, just like good wine, get better with time.
If it’s been a while between drinks, pop down this weekend and see some of the best bartenders in the country work their magic in the best bar in the land that’s open to 3am every morning.
Black Pearl, 304 Brunswick St, Fitzroy.
FOR THE CARNIVORES
Fire and nice
It’s little wonder the empanadas at Asado are terrific. They have been perfected over many years, after all, by the team who have been serving a slice of Buenos Aires-style beef eating to Melbourne for the past seven-odd years at San Telmo.
These golden, buttery pastry parcels filled with juicy, paprika-scented beef, boiled egg and a fine dice of green olives that deliver briny cut through, are exceptional. Paired with a Patagonian lager brewed here in Melbourne to spec, as an opening snack they’re hard to beat.
Adding South American swagger to Southbank, Asado is the fifth meat-and-malbec venue from the San Telmo team.
It’s the largest of the family, a 250-seat behemoth cleverly broken into booth and bar seating that’s stylishly on theme — hides and leather, chequered-tiled floors and cool mosaic murals — where cow is king and fire fuels the fun.
Chef Ollie Gould is stoking the open fire pit, where whole beasts are splayed and roasted — the suckling pig is excellent, especially when teamed with a side of chargrilled carrots seasoned with pepitas and dolloped with yoghurt.
Steaks, of course, are as expertly treated as the cellar is stocked with big-hitting malbecs and other juicy reds.
A sandwicheria where sandwiches to go — along with those winning empanadas — has just opened, perfect for grabbing a bite on the run.
Asado, 6 Riverside Quay, Southbank.
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