Melbourne restaurant, cafe kingpins opening back up after lockdown
Lockdown crippled our city’s restaurant and cafes, but these hospitality kingpins are back and hungry for a new chapter.
Food
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Snap lockdowns, staff shortages and almost everything to do with coronavirus has put Victoria’s hospitality scene through the ringer over the last two years.
As we return to Covid normal, we share the Melbourne restaurant and cafe kingpins who continued to reinvent the wheel during hospitality’s darkest days.
SCOTT PICKETT
Hotel Continental, Smith St Bistro executive chef, restaurateur
In lockdown it felt like Scott Pickett was opening a restaurant-a-minute. After pulling Melbourne icon Longrain from the brink— just months after opening his CBD fine diner Chancery Lane— Pickett also embarked on his biggest project yet.
The chef/restaurateur joined publican Craig Shearer to run the food offering at The Continental Sorrento — a multimillion-dollar precinct by consortium Victor Smorgon Group, Kanat Group and Trenerry Property.
In 12 months, the team has turned the heritage building into a luxe Euro-style resort, with 12 new eateries, including a seafood fine diner Audrey’s, casual restaurant and poolside and rooftop bars.
Audrey’s will be Pickett’s seventh restaurant when it opens at the complex next month.
Earlier this year the chef also opened French-inspired Smith St Bistro in Collingwood, to fill the void of his defunct Italian diner Lupo.
CHRIS LUCAS
Lucas Restaurants founder, restaurateur
Chris Lucas has been a driving force in Melbourne’s restaurant scene for many years and in the last two has been vocal about the negative impact of Covid restrictions within hospitality. Last year was another big one for Lucas. He opened three venues, including the highly anticipated Society Restaurant and dealt with the fallout of losing star chef Martin Benn and Vicki Wild from the project. He’d also opened, in quick succession, fast-paced Japanese eatery Yakimono and modern-Australian restaurant Lillian Terrace.
This week Lucas opened his ninth venue, Grill Americano, opposite the home of his first Melbourne restaurant, Chin Chin.
JESSI SINGH
Daughter in Law, Bar Bombay owner
Jessi Singh continued to open restaurants Australia-wide in lockdown. The founder of Melbourne’s unauthentic Indian restaurant Daughter in Law opened outposts of the popular restaurant in Adelaide and Byron Bay while his other restaurants were shuttered.
While his South Melbourne bistro Mr Brownie Rooftop remained in tact, luxe CBD bar Mrs Singh was forced to close earlier this year. Singh has since revealed plans for a new venue in the Flinders Ln space— an uncolonial yacht club Bar Bombay— which will open later this month.
JULIEN MOUSSI
Only Hospitality Group founder
Lockdown didn’t stop Melbourne’s cafe king Julien Moussi from expanding his empire. Recently Moussi took his city cafe community bayside, opening Hudson in Rosebud, Buckley in Sorrento and Bonny in Blairgowrie. The Inglewood coffee founder also opened Nelson in Box Hill and completed his passion project, Hotel Collingwood, just as Melbourne was waking from its lockdown slumber last year.
Moussi also offered chefs free accommodation for a year in a staff house opposite the beach in Rosebud, on top of an $85,000 wage, to secure workers over summer.
SHANNON MARTINEZ
Smith and Daughters founder, Lona Misa co-Creative Culinary Partner
Our vegan food queen Shannon Martinez relocated Smith and Daughters, the restaurant the made her famous, to a larger, loftier warehouse in Collingwood in between lockdowns.
At the same time she opened Smith and Deli, which sells plant based snacks under the same roof. The move came months after opening another vegan restaurant, Lona Misa, with hospo great Ian Curley below South Yarra’s Ovolo Hotel.
Martinez will host a wild celebration of cruelty-free eats at Welcome to the Jungle at the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival when it returns after a two-year hiatus this week.
JACKIE MIDDLETON, SIMON O’REGAN
Earl Canteen, Dame founders
Earl Canteen founders Jackie Middleton and Simon O’Regan didn’t plan on buying a CBD cafe while the city faced crippling lockdowns. But the duo has now come out on top after crowds started returning to Melbourne’s CBD. You’ll find Dame, their new daytime eatery, at high-end Collins Place. Middleton and O’Regan opened Earl Canteen in 2010, growing the brand to seven locations— including at Melbourne Airport— before opening Dame.
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