I don’t remember why I originally ventured into the Olive Jar in Rathdowne Street, Carlton, but I do remember leaning over the candlelit table during that first meal in 2018 and whispering to my husband, “I think this is my favourite restaurant in the world.”

It was a busy weekend night, the amatriciana in front of me was appropriately sloppy and spicy and served in a blackened saucepan, and owner Giovanni Mico had just started singing My Way, tableside, to a gaggle of older women, who were swooning over his silky vocals and silvery hair.

That has been the shtick at Olive Jar, since at least 2014, when its name (but not ownership) changed (it was called La Contadina for the previous 30 years): you eat, and you get a serenade from Giovanni, a silver fox who must have been the king of this neighbourhood back in the day.

The room was classic: brick walls, crowded with a hodgepodge of old and ’60s modern art, as well as cast-iron pans with signs on them claiming that they’d been brought from the old country by “Nonna”.

The food was pure vintage Carlton – handmade pastas, antipasti, classic mains, and slightly sketchy limoncello “made by Grandpa”. It wasn’t the best Italian food in town by a long shot, but it was so totally of its place, so Melbourne – if not of its time any more. It felt utterly precious.

I was smitten enough with Olive Jar that I wrote about it for my then column for The New York Times, comparing it to the newly opened Capitano across the street as examples of old and new Carlton; old and new Italian-Australian.

That contrast became less visible as of last week, when the owners of the Olive Jar announced via social media that the restaurant had closed.

I love new Carlton, and I especially appreciate that many of the young local restaurateurs are paying homage to the Italian history of the neighbourhood. But it’s sad to see the literal history – in restaurant form – disappearing.

In the Olive Jar’s case, it’s not necessarily surprising. The place had its oddities. There was one jaunty number Giovanni did that required one of the waitresses to dance a special little dance, and the scene was so odd, it was like being in some Australian version of a David Lynch film.

Speaking of cinema, there were days and weeks when the place went dark, with signs in the window saying the closure was because the owners were off making their own movie, which hinted at being, basically, The Godfather, set in Carlton.

The Olive Jar was one of Melbourne’s most place-specific, longest-running, only-in-Carlton bastions of weirdness.

After that New York Times article, a disgruntled reader wrote to me to point out that some of their social media posts appeared to have pro-Trump hashtags on them, which may have been a misguided attempt at tricking the algorithm into engagement rather than an honest pledge of loyalty to the former president, but either way, it backfired – I know more than one person who stopped eating at the Olive Jar as a result.

In recent years, business has been very slow, and even at weekends there have usually been only one or two tables for Giovanni to serenade. Their weeknight $10 pizza or pasta deal seemed to lose its lustre post-Covid.

Up the block, the chairs out the front of Bar Bellamy are overflowing, a sign of what’s to come in this neighbourhood – small, personal, modern bars with food that caters to a young crowd who want nice cocktails and small plates, not cheap wine and (very) large plates. Up the road a bit in Carlton North, the original La Porchetta closed in February, while all around it new wine bars rise and rise.

These places that are closing in this area are big family restaurants in what used to be a big family neighbourhood – not just any families, but (big) Italian families. There are plenty of households with kids in Carlton now, but they’re less Italian, and less multi-generational, and most of Carlton’s permanent residents are young professionals who did not grow up here, or newer immigrants from Africa and South Asia.

All of these people bring with them the demand for different kinds of foods, different kinds of restaurants, and I’d be foolish to bemoan Olive Jar’s closing as some kind of death knell for Carlton’s Italian soul – Melbourne has been for over a century a place that’s exciting because it’s constantly evolving, mostly thanks to our changing immigrant populations.

But allow me to pour one out for this particular slice of particularity. The Olive Jar was one of Melbourne’s most place-specific, longest-running, only-in-Carlton bastions of weirdness, and I will forever cherish my memories of being serenaded in that wonderful Australian-Italian accent, while drinking sketchy limoncello, surrounded by giddy old ladies and baffled newcomers.

You did it your way, Giovanni. Kudos.