We’ve all got to eat so it might as well be good! I’ve been a restaurant critic for almost 20 years, and have been writing a weekly restaurant column in Melbourne’s Sunday Age since 2006.
My approach is to always take a restaurant on its own terms: there’s no point slamming a burger joint because it doesn’t have white tablecloths. I try to be constructive in my criticism and I’ve always got the diner in mind: there are many places you could choose to go. Why should it be here?
Pizza in Hampton? Easy. Takeaway Indian? Yep. Coffee? Can do. But smart little wine bar? Until Hampton Wine Co swept in to slake the suburb’s thirst, it was slim pickings for interesting tipples served with expertise and enthusiasm. Bayside’s rescue squad comprises three ex-Jacques Reymond soldiers: chef Jarrod Amos, sommelier Glenn Mill and manager Pierre Geoffroy, young guys with plenty of experience plus childhood history in the area. They’ve also got enough nous to keep their first business simple so the focus can be on making each element good.
There are some certainties at Caterina’s, a 20-year-old business lunch hub in a blessedly old-fashioned basement. You can count on owner Caterina Borsato being there, seeing all, reading the room, delivering each diner the experience they are there for. That might be a quick sanity break and bowl of pasta on a trying day, a deal-making lunch in a quiet corner shielded by a serious bottle of red, or a golden handshake shakedown that will likely extend to dinnertime.
There are good things to say about Tetsujin. I know it because my 10-year-old listed them, unprompted, a few days after we visited. “I love sushi trains,” she exclaimed. “They are so fun and exciting for the whole family and we should have one at home, not just for sushi, but for every meal.” Right, that’s the next birthday sorted.
Unless you want waves, Williamstown Beach has it all. Cricket players leap for one-handed catches over shell-flecked sand. Bikini babes roast. Seagulls steal chips. Snorkellers bob at the bluestone breakwater. Nonnas walk arm-in-arm on the promenade. Kids complain about sunscreen. Babies scream in beach tents. Couples keep the flame alive with a cooler bag of oysters and champagne. Container ships creep across the horizon. A showcase of Aussie domestic architecture overlooks the beach road: Victorian fancy work, fibro modesty, ethnic ostentation, gleaming riche. It’s a seaside village in a city of four million people and it’s really nice.
Eaten any snails lately? You should, and not just because they are an excellent excuse to marinate yourself in melted butter. Firm, salty sea snails (Tasmanian periwinkles) also offer a good reason to visit Copper Pot, the first restaurant from chef Ashley Davis. The menu says they’re served “how they should be” and I’d agree: bobbing in green-tinged shells, they’re meaty and unadorned, slow-cooked then lavishly loved up with garlicky butter. The snails are a signpost. Copper Pot bills itself as “a foodies’ roadtrip around Europe” and it visits some lesser lights: Croatia, Portugal and Germany as well as the power trio of France, Italy and Spain. The produce, by contrast, is a passionate, ethical exploration of Australia.
There may not be a scientific correlation between the pride with which a dish is served and the pleasure with which it’s consumed but I’m sure there’s an association. Everything at Anju, a casual Korean bar and restaurant, is delivered with a tangible, though often silent wish that it will satisfy. It would taste good anyway – the food is fresh, careful and punchy, with big flavours that marry well with alcohol – but there’s an amplification sparked by the fervent hope that everything will be truly enjoyed.
I can feel it: 2016 is the year I’ll be nurturing a sourdough starter, stuffing my own sausages, churning my own butter and turning pallets of tomatoes into a year’s supply of passata. And, on the off chance that none of these DIY resolutions makes it to February, I’ll be coming to the Craft and Co and enjoying the handmade goodies of proper makers and creators.
It’s a lazy time of year. If the remote control is out of reach then I stay on the same channel. If the bread isn’t sliced I just tear off a hunk and shove it down. If no one gets me a glass of water then I guess I’ll be thirsty. I do have a survival plan, though: have someone piggyback me to Las Chicas for a happy holiday brunch.
Stop wondering where you’ll be hanging out this summer. It’s here, at 127 Brunswick Street, a three-venue five-level indoor-outdoor dining and drinking playground. This optimistic megalith was carved out of an 1850s pub by Vince Sofo and Paul Adamo, nightclub guys from way back and owners of the currently closed Espy.
Seasonal circumstances find many a soul at Shujinko, a 24-hour ramen restaurant on Russell Street. Epic shopping efforts can call for the kind of afternoon refuelling only noodles and rich broth can offer. Good sense may haul a person out of the office Christmas party in need of a steadying soup before soldiering home. A let’s-have-a-drink-before-the-holidays session could require comforting calorific boosting at either end of the evening. And, of course, you might just come here because you like it.
