This hip little eating house and bar (think '70s LPs, massed beer bottles, and a laneway locale) has spunk. It also has new chef Hugh Maxwell (ex sous at Perfect Drop), an ambitious owner, good staff and a drinks lists with five pages on gin alone. Much of the sassy menu features produce from Central Victoria: Tooborac Berkshire pork, Erindale Farm rump steak. Time is another prime ingredient, used liberally in soft, sweet lamb neck cooked for 18 hours; it might come on a base of eggplant puree and with pea-sized cous cous studded with currants and harissa. Vegetarian dishes are approached with care; a pretty triplet of cooked, raw and pickled baby vegies with a dainty quail's egg, silky pumpkin custard and Middle Eastern-spiced almond soil for earthy depth of flavour. Desserts run from a ruinous chocolate tart, biscuit, fudge and icecream line-up to the delicate flavours of green-tea lamington teamed with elderflower and lychee jelly.