Melbourne Patron

Kisumé Japanese Restaurant The new fine-dining venture on Flinders Lane by the Lucas Group Any Melburnian foodie worth their salt is aware of the Lucas Group and its portfolio of very successful restaurants: Chin Chin , a loud hall of colourful South-East Asian food and cocktails on Flinders Lane that still attracts queues of several hours' wait, some six years after its opening Hawker Hall , a similar style venue to Chin Chin but on South Yarra's Chapel Street and with more of a focus on street food, that once infamously proffered a wait time equal to a return drive to Torquay with a beer stop in the middle Baby Pizza , quiet stalwart of the group, churning out delectable, fresh Italian food on Church Street, and  Kong , offering Japanese-Korean BBQ fusion also on Church Street, and perhaps the most casual venue of the lot.  And if you have read any of my posts before, you will know that I am utterly fed up with the 'Americana' craze, whereby every...

Everyone likes cheese, right? OK, except maybe the lactose intolerant, and some people are averse to blue cheese. I love it all. Aside from one bad experience when I ate far too much camembert one Christmas and was subsequently quite ill, I will usually happily eat ALL the cheese, all the time. And yes, I am aware it's not terribly healthy, but pffff, I don't care (much), and yes, I am also aware there is a old wives' tale that cheese gives you crazy dreams... Awesome! Bring it on. Cheese counter at Milk the Cow St Kilda In 2012, St Kilda was all abuzz with the opening of Milk the Cow  (157 Fitzroy St, St Kilda), a 'licenced fromagerie' - which I take to mean 'cheese shop that sells alcohol'... unless you need some kind of special licence to sell cheese? (Apart from unpasteurised cheese - which I'm pretty sure is illegal - I don't think you do.) Intriguing. A bar that sells cheese? Or a cheese shop that lets you drink? Eat/drink in, or out?...

Named for children's author Paul Jennings , this baby in Richmond's on-again off-again hospitality wasteland of Bridge Road is one for the real foodies. It is the solo venture of Head Chef Ryan Flaherty, who has stinted at world-renowned restaurants El Bulli and The Fat Duck , then jointly brought Northcote's The Estelle to foodie fame along with then-business partner, Scott Pickett. Flaherty's passion, creativity and refined skill is evident in his food, and indeed the whole of Mister Jennings (142 Bridge Road, Richmond) is a pretty schmick affair. It's an unassuming shopfront in amongst the retail section of Bridge Road, near the corner of Lennox Street. Mister Jennings had been on my restaurant hit list for so long that by the time I got there, I'd managed to avoid the 'just opened' crowds, and aside from maybe three other tables, we had the place to ourselves. Then again, it's not a massive restaurant, and it was mid-week in late March ...