New restaurant openings in Victoria August 2023: Alto Bakes Altona
Anyone can sell croissants, but a Melbourne chef turned superstar baker knew there was one way to get customers through the door.
Food
Don't miss out on the headlines from Food. Followed categories will be added to My News.
Anyone can sell croissants, but making them from scratch daily is a labour of love.
Melbourne chef-turned-superstar suburban baker Brigitte Baird wanted a drawcard reason for the locals to visit her new Altona bakery.
Altobakes moved into Harrington Square, off Maidstone St, last month and will soon be selling batches of the flaky French favourite.
“Myself and a friend, who is working with me, have made them for years and we thought that’d be cool to offer that to the community,” she said.
Altobakes makes most of what it sells from scratch that day, honouring what’s best and fresh.
Expect hot beef pies and sausage rolls, made with Laverton butcher Paddock to Table meat, as well as vanilla slices, caramel tarts, brown butter and chocolate fudge cookies and hot jam and cinnamon doughnuts. They also sell tray pizza bakes.
Baird has worked in some of Melbourne’s top kitchens such as Red Spice Road and Rockpool but says her skill and passion for cooking came from her time at Spotswood’s Candied Bakery.
“Owners Orlando Artavilla and Toula Ploumidis were such good mentors and had such a respect for quality ingredients. I love how they honoured traditional (cooking) methods and the work environment they created,” she said.
As for the biggest seller so far? Altobakes sausage rolls and pies have sold like hotcakes.
“They double the sales of all my sweets combined,” she said.
Dukes Coffee will be on the machine.
Altobakes, 11 Harrington Square, Altona, instagram.com/altobakes.altona
Miss Amelie moves into Prahran Market
A booming bordertown bakery behind Australia’s best gourmet pie has opened its first Melbourne store.
Miss Amelie Gourmet moved into the Prahran Market on Friday after growing a cult-like regional following during Covid lockdown.
In three years, the business has evolved from a pop-up operation run from a shed to three thriving High Country locations in Beechworth, Wodonga and Albury.
But things started to take off for the business after it won the Best Gourmet Pie category in the 2022 Great Aussie Pie Competition.
Owners, friends and neighbours Nicki and Jim Myers and Ken and Rachel Little still can’t believe their success.
“We started off as a country business and ended up with a product that is amazing,” Nicki said.
Miss Amelie Gourmet will sell 10 pie flavours at its Prahran Market location including lamb, garlic and rosemary, Thai red duck curry, chicken and leek, Moroccan Goat and the trophy-winning Chinese BBQ pork belly.
There’s even a ‘gut friendly’ pie in the works cooked with kombucha and made with a gluten-free base.
Naked pies – bowls of pie filling – will also be sold at the shop.
All pies will be available hot, cold or frozen.
Miss Amelie, Prahran Market (enter via Elizabeth St), 163 Commercial Rd, South Yarra
Sweet new cake trend sweeps CBD
Melbourne’s newest cake shop plays to both trend and tradition.
Miilk Cake Studio’s social media pages may suggest it’s leaning into the city’s pastel-coloured and rosette-piped vintage cake obsession.
But baker Tia Tan said there’s more to this family business than meets the eye.
“My family is from Singapore. My dad has been in bakeries since he was very young, baking and decorating,” she said.
Tan’s family went on to run a cheesecake business, but felt creatively restricted.
“We never felt we could bring our family recipes into the business, so we decided to open our own.”
What started as a lockdown online project has been realised into a bricks-and-mortar store on Swanston St, opening late July.
“I’m a massive foodie and love eating weird things ... and we wanted to introduce some ‘travel the world’ recipes into our cakes,” Tan said.
Lesser-known Southeast Asian ingredients such as Filipino ube (purple sweet potato) and Japanese hojicha (roasted green tea) and matcha make up some of the 21 cake flavours.
Baker Ken Bo, with the help of Tan and her parents Calista Lee and Richard Tan, inject Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Singaporean, Vietnamese and Thai flavours into their cakes.
“We are traditional in flavour but modern in looks. We use a lot of rosette and flat piping, but also use modern flavours such as coffee, homemade caramel and chocolate sauces,” she said.
Miilk Cake Studio joins Thornbury bakery Mali Bakes who is making sweet treats inspired by Thai flavours.
Underbar’s shock exit from boutique hotel
Ballarat fine diner Underbar is moving back to its original home, less than a year after taking residence in the regional city’s luxe new hotel development.
The sixteen-seater, run by chef Derek Boath and partner Lucy Taylor, relocated from its tiny CBD digs mid-last year to become boutique accommodation Hotel Vera’s flagship restaurant.
But after 10 months, Boath revealed he was moving the venue back to its Doveton St North digs of seven years after “unexpectedly” finding itself without a home.
Boath, and two other staff, were reportedly made redundant by the hotel last month, which prompted the move.
Pencilmark, his wine bar which currently occupies the site, will close to make room for Underbar.
“We have made the tough decision to close Pencilmark temporarily so we can relocate Underbar back to Doveton St,” he wrote on Instagram.
“Underbar has unexpectedly found itself without a home, from Friday 11 August we will be back in our old home at 3 Doveton St North — same team, same food, same wine, just a flashback to our old digs.”
“We have had to make a tough decision to close one of our restaurants to save the other”.
“The best way we can keep pur little team employed is to move Underbar back home to Doveton Street.”
Pencilmark closed temporarily on Monday.
Dining vouchers will still be honoured at upcoming Pencilmark events or at Underbar.
Hotel Vera said in a statement it had made the decision to amicably part ways with Underbar.
“In these challenging economic times, the hotel business has been unable to continue to support the restaurant of being open just two days a week.”
“The restaurant space will remain open for in-house guest’s breakfast, whilst we search for a partner more compatible with our hotel opening hours, ethos and philosophy.
“We wish Underbar a successful future.”
Underbar opens September bookings from 9am Tuesday: underbar.com.au/reservations.
Victorians clean up at wine awards
Mark Walpole is a “one man band” at Beechworth’s Fighting Gully Road.
Not only does he run the winery, but he’s in charge of the vineyard and winemaking program.
“It’s a full-time job,” he said.
Walpole was named 2024 Halliday Wine Companion’s Viticulturist of the Year, revealed in a lavish ceremony at St Kilda’s Stokehouse Restaurant last week.
Eight other Victorian wineries were named as major award winners, including Joshua Cooper Wines, Anderson & Marsh and Oakridge Wines.
Walpole, who leases one of the oldest vineyards in the region, said the accolade honoured years of research and innovation.
“It’s a culmination of quite a number of years,” he said.
“I’m always trying new varieties, picking up things, under very trying conditions.”
“It’s a testament to the vineyards. This year was one of the coolest seasons on record and we had planted (warm climate) varieties for climate change such as grenache and verdicchio.
“We could have failed miserably, but they have come out very well. That’s the thing I’m happiest about.”
Winemaker of the year was awarded to Yarra Valley expat turned Coonawarra wine champ Kate Goodman.
She donated $30,000 to Breast Cancer Network Australia after winning the award, having just undergone treatment for her second bout of the disease.
She also plans to stand on the MCG as part of BCNA’s Field of Women on August 20.
2024 VICTORIAN AWARD WINNERS
Viticulturist of the Year: Mark Walpole, Fighting Gully Road, Beechworth.
Best New Winery: Joshua Cooper Wines, Victoria.
Dark Horse: Anderson & Marsh, Alpine Valleys.
Best Value Winery: Oakridge Wines, Yarra Valley.
Pinot Gris/Grigio of the Year: 2022 Mayer Bloody Hill Villages Healesville Pinot Gris.
Rosé of the Year: 2022 Sutton Grange Winery Fairbank Rosé.
Pinot noir of the Year: 2022 Giant Steps Applejack Vineyard pinot noir.
Other Reds & Blends of the Year: 2021 Yarra Yering Dry Red Wine No. 3, Yarra Valley.
Fortified Wine of the Year: All Saints Estate Museum Muscat NV, Rutherglen.
Tiny CBD bar cleans up at prestigious global competition
A Melbourne bar has again been named among the world’s best — snagging a swag of awards at a prestigious global competition overnight.
No, Chris Lucas didn’t name his new French restaurant ‘bastard’
Eight years and a rumoured $45m later, Chris Lucas is finally opening his newest venue — a four-level French behemoth in the city next month. Just don’t say the name has a crude translation.