A survey of Melbourne’s best bars for last year’s The Age Good Food Guide found better boozing in the ’burbs was on the rise . Slowly but surely, that trend is continuing, with more spots opening in suburbs not without licensed venues, but where locals are crying out for a neighbourhood watering hole to call their own. Here are three to try.
Bar Brillo, Aberfeldie The “espresso bar” sign is all that remains of 25 Tilba Street, the cafe Carlo Mellini has spent the year flipping into backstreet wine-diner Bar Brillo. It now services the north-west suburb when neighbouring grocery-cafe Aberfeldie Salumeria closes for the day. “It made sense for the neighbourhood to have variation,” says Mellini, who also owns Avondale Heights’s Cannoli Bar .
“We just want to make Aberfeldie great.” So it’s out with Italian coffee and pastries and in with small plates and glasses of vino in a pocket of Melbourne short on night-time options. A handsome walnut-coloured bar borders the open kitchen, where jars of house-pickled vegetables line the wall.
Chef Thomas Du is serving a menu he’ll shake up with the seasons. You might find wild-venison salami; kingfish crudo dressed with blood orange, pickled radish and wasabi leaf; or tagliatelle with a rich lamb ragu – a Mellini family recipe. “Brillo means ‘tipsy’ in Italian,” says Mellini.
And that department is sorted with some organic Sicilian wines that nod to his heritage, and a short but sharp selection of amari, t.