In February, chef Paul “Yoda” Iskov of native food pop-up Fervor went to Adelaide and cooked with former Fervor chef (and southwest resident) Jamie Musgrave of Restaurant Botanic: a high-powered fine diner in the city’s botanical gardens that, like Fervor, focuses on native Australian ingredients and flavours. This month, WA hosts the fixture’s return leg with Restaurant Botanic and team Fervor joining forces for an intimate 30-person dinner at Howard Park’s Wine Chapel on Thursday April 24 that will highlight flavours and ingredients from the Wardandi and Bibbulmun regions alongside Howard Park wines. Tickets are $295 per person.

The new-look Taste Great Southern

First held in 1999, Taste Great Southern has long celebrated the deliciousness of our most southerly food and drink region. For its 2025 edition (May 1-4) the festival has switched to a more condensed four-day program that will deliver more bang for buck – and likely pangs of FOMO – for visitors heading south and making a long weekend out of the festivities. One of this year’s showcase events will be Tides of Taste (May 2-3) at luxury retreat Maitraya overlooking the Southern Ocean. Held over two evenings, the event will feature canapes and live cooking from a line-up of top-tier local chefs as well as Mark LaBrooy, formerly of Three Blue Ducks.

Other festival highlights include the Denmark Wine Hop (May 3), an all-day, hop-on and hop-off cellar door discovery tour where buses will whisk guests to key cellar doors throughout the day to enjoy wine, food and live music; Sunday’s Taste Market (May 4) starring local producers and guest chefs for tastings and demonstrations; plus the festival’s DJ-powered closing party, the Elite Pie Party (May 4) that brings together baking powerhouses Bred Co and Big Loaf plus renegade winemaker La Violetta to end the festival on a high.

Hi-fi listening bar Astral Weeks turns three

It’s hard to imagine Perth’s drinks landscape without this intimate listening bar tucked away in the city’s Chinatown: such is the popularity of Astral Weeks. On Saturday (April), the bar hosts its annual birthday party featuring a line-up of DJs and record collectors, drinks specials, plus snacks prepared by Branden Scott, chef of the bar’s intimate, 25-seat Ah Um dining room. Entry is free and doors open at 4pm: as ever, arriving early to bags your favourite table is the smart play.

A modern African food story

Traditionally, people working in kitchens do their best to keep hair out of food. That won’t be the case when Follicle comes to Northbridge’s modern African dining Peasant’s Paradice (April 12-13). A joint effort between the restaurant’s Zimbabwean-born chef Dwayne Alexander, South African artist Calvin Thoo and former Kaya Radio host Soshi Montsitsi, Follicle explores the culture of hair – also known as roots or follicles – within the diverse African diaspora and will weave together art and food to tell five unique, yet similar stories. Choose from a lunch seating (Sunday) or two dinner seatings (Saturday and Sunday). Tickets are $75 and available online.

Showcasing sustainable seafood at Bib & Tucker

To mark the start of sustainable seafood week, North Fremantle’s Bib & Tucker is hosting a sustainable seafood dinner (April 8) showcasing West Australian seafood sourced from fisheries that have been certified as sustainably wild-caught by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC). Dinner will feature Augusta abalone, Fremantle octopus, toothfish and western rock lobster: the world’s first fishery to receive MSC certification. Tickets are $120 per person with an optional wine pairing available for $60.