The 50 best restaurants in Melbourne

Time Out’s Restaurant of the Year (also our Best Casual Dining Venue) is a shot in the arm for the city’s food culture. Riffing on chef Ross Magnaye’s Filipino heritage without suggesting anything like straightlaced authenticity, the fire-licked food is irreverent, playful and fun while also introducing the non-Filipino Melbournians to a new world of flavour. Backed by a pithy, natural-leaning wine list and a whole lot of buzz, the menu is a tour-de-force of things we want to eat. Such as the lechon, the roasted free-range pig married to a pineapple-infused, gently spicy-sweet palapa sauce. Or the deliciously inauthentic McScallop, a cheeky riposte to the golden arches starring a single fried scallop doused in deliriously rich crab-fat sauce cut through with papaya pickle and sandwiched in a toasted pandesal bun. The only challenging thing about Serai? Trying to score a table.  

For anyone to whom the phrase “fine dining” means a kind of starched-linen torture, Grill Americano is here to change your mind. Time Out’s fine diner of the year is the opposite of stuffy. A Rat Pack-worthy stage set of marble, velvet and terrazzo, it’s bursting with brio. Fine times become fun times with a menu delivering the Italian-American grill songbook and a wine list with the undertow of Bass Strait. Sure, it doesn’t come cheap, but it deserves the splash-out with a thousand tiny touches such as the perfect little circle of mandarin rind crowning the ice cube in your Americano cocktail. Cold noses begone. What’s not to love? This royal-blue hued, brand-spanking-new restaurant, will leave you feeling tickled pink. This one is worth remembering how to get dressed up for.

Exquisite dishes notwithstanding, Minamishima is a masterclass experience in excellent service and meticulous attention to detail. As we turn from one dish to the next, the table is meticulously constructed around us with different ceramic saucers and implements taking centre stage. Everything is elegant and artful, right down to the zigzagged wet towel for us to dampen our hands with between sushi eating. A convivial quality is present in waitstaff. Minamishima’s genuine warmth and affection for what they do is matched by the sushi, the best we’ve had in Melbourne. 

There’s something brewing in the heart of Little Collins Street. It could be the numerous jars of potato skins or cabbage fermenting away in Sunda’s latest sibling, Aru Restaurant, or perhaps it’s Khanh Nguyen’s playful and determined spirit. Whatever it is, it’s a welcome change in a relatively underserved pocket of the CBD. The venue heroes pre-colonial techniques of cookery across Southeast Asia – “cooking over fire, preserving, fermenting, dry-aging, curing and all those kinds of treatments” says Nguyen. It’s a spirited take on the ‘f’ word that can often miss the mark, but here, Nguyen manages to make light-hearted commentary on colonisation through his fusion food, and he does so in a way that’s both moreish and respectful.

Tucked inside Collins Street’s heritage-listed Olderfleet building, the street visible through a trio of ecclesiastical windows, Freyja is a restaurant immune from any accusations of culinary copying. Under the leadership of Jae Bang, formerly head chef at Norway’s two-Michelin-gonged Re- Naa, Freyja swings from daytime smørrebrød, the traditional Danish open sandwiches we prefer to think of as a full meal on rye, to a dinner menu packing cool Scandi sophistication. Ironically for a restaurant named after an over-worked Norse goddess, Freyja is trailblazing a work/life balance for its staff by opening only on Tuesday to Saturday. It’s another Scandinavian approach to life we’re happy to embrace. This goddess has earned her break, and our devotion.

Gimlet at Cavendish House was an institution before it even began service. With an iconic 1920s building as a foundation, an Acme and Co renovation, and Andrew McConnell at the helm, it would almost be hard to get it wrong. And they certainly do not. Everything about Gimlet is oh-so right. Gimlet brings us a taste of old-world, European nostalgia that we haven’t been able to access in two-too-many years now. With a wood-fired oven taking centre stage in the kitchen, a smoky, heady aroma of grilled meat and seafood permeates the air. Whichever protein you choose, and all are excellent choices, don’t skip the French fries or the wood-roasted Jerusalem artichoke, sunflower and pecorino on the side, and do yourself a favour, leave room for dessert. Not only a good excuse to stay around a little longer, but the baked Valrhona chocolate with crème fraîche will linger sweetly on your tongue, and in your mind, long after you’ve licked the plate clean (but please don’t actually lick the plate – this is not that kind of place).

A dark staircase entranceway leads down to a warm, energetic space with a slightly subterranean vibe, that buffers from the hubbub outside, while at the same time suggesting you are in one of the most happening pockets of the city. Soft lighting, combined with the polished wooden floors, cool blue tones and generously spaced tables creates a cosy, cave-like dining area which builds a sense of anticipation for what is to come and the knowledge that you are in for an inspired dining experience. The smell of toasty spices emanates from the metaphorical and physical heart of the restaurant, the wood-fired oven. Its creations are born here. Fish, meat and bread all receive its smokey embrace, peppering a charred and fat-rendered profile throughout your dining experience. The service at Nomad is effortless. Staff are readily available, yet unless requested, intervention is minimal. Water glasses are invisibly re-filled and dropped napkins are superstitiously replaced. This makes Nomad the perfect date, or group dining experience, it allows you to focus on your companions yet want for nothing.

Like Siba the standard poodle who was recently named Best in Show at the esteemed Westminster Dog Show, Poodle Bar & Bistro has jumped the final hurdle and landed in the top ten spots of the best restaurants list for 2022. The art-deco inspired interior is the perfect backdrop for an array of retro-revolutionised dishes such as the Poodle prawn cocktail and devilled Morton Bay bug salad, which will leave you wondering whether you were born in the wrong decade. At Poodle, there really is something special for everyone. Grab a snack and a late-night drink at the public bar, impress your date with delectable morsels in the moody bistro, enjoy Sunday afternoon Spritzes in the courtyard with the gals, or rally the troops for a decadent, caviar-included, bottomless brunch. Its unassuming exterior is part of its unexpected allure. Poodle is fancy but fun. Kitsch but cool. A bloody good time and an unfaultable meal. It's the kind of restaurant that is sure to make you feel happy with your decision to get off the couch. Do not miss this one in 2022.

Fine dining and comfort food aren’t usually synonymous with each other, but here we are at Amaru, a venue that will leave you thinking otherwise. There’s no smoke and mirrors to be seen here at Amaru, just pure ingenuity coupled with good intentions. If this marks the renaissance of comfort food, we’re here to fully embrace it.

Koreans have a word for food that’s consumed with alcohol – anju – and while a lot of the anju we see here in Melbourne are things like sticky soy garlic-glazed fried chicken wings or thin strips of beef sizzling away on a Korean barbecue, tiny eatery Chae is here to highlight a different side to Korean cuisine. Chae started in a Brunswick apartment and has recently experienced a change of scenery, relocating to Cockatoo, to be surrounded by greenery and nature around 50km southeast of the Melbourne CBD. Chae remains as intimate, as exquisite and as charming as ever.

Think of it as an ultra-boutique Japanese banquet running headlong into performance art and theatre. Omakase is a showcase of skill and showmanship, although Warabi deformalises the experience with an emphasis on chef-diner interactions. The cross-counter chat proves a welcome pressure valve to those gathered in the serene, timber-lined cocoon lording it above Collins Street – at least before the sake has its chance to do some mood-loosening of its own. The rules of Warabi engagement are as follows: 12 ringside seats, $245 a head. Like a stage production, it waits for no one: kick-off is 5.30pm and 8pm, with a two-hour sitting time proving long enough to transport you to Tokyo’s glittering Ginza and back. Two hours of omakase power later, the chef show is over. The temptation is to clap, but even this dining spectacle demands some deference. So let’s make up for it now. Applause. 

A meal at Vue de Monde is still dressed in the accoutrements of the Euro gastro-palaces Bennett came of age emulating. A Champagne trolley greets you on arrival; a cheese trolley helps bid adieu. But this classical sandwich contains a modern filling that’s a more nuanced taste of Australia than before. The earnest moments have largely been banished; the mood is light-hearted rather than quasi-religious. 

On Lygon Street's kingdom of carbs and cheese comes the Japanese-ish, French-ish Kazuki's from Daylesford. There are two ways to tackle Kazuki’s, starting at the five-course option for $130 and heading northwards to the seven-course menu for $160. Our advice: go the five-course menu, if only to commandeer the four snacks as the first course, which could include Goolwa pipis on the shell, a profiterole filled with parfait and Davidson plum jam, grilled duck hearts, or whipped cod roe on a nori crisp.

Walking down Hardware Lane means running the gauntlet of cheek-by-jowl waiters trying to entice potential diners into their venues with proffered 15-page illustrated menus. But not all venues rely on their front-of-house to charm the masses on the hoof, and restaurants like Hardware Club prove this with one-page menus full of straight-up Italian-inspired hits.

It takes a full day to dine at Brae. A meal at one of Victoria’s most highly decorated fine-dining institutions fits a micro holiday into the hours needed to get out to the gently sloping paddocks of Birregurra (an easy two-hour drive from Melbourne), dine in rural splendour at an appropriately relaxed pace at Dan Hunter’s famous farmhouse restaurant, and return home. You will be enveloped in a style of hospitality so convivial and assured that five hours will fly by while you exist in a state of suspended bliss. 

Navi is a fine dining den of distinction, where cork tiles line the ceiling, moody hues rule the walls, and a mere 25 seats dot the narrow shopfront floor and the bar overlooking the cooking action.  Navi is a chef’s-own temple, down to the a la mode pottery Hills threw himself, the soundtrack of “I'm playing what I goddamn like” and the snackage sent in to soften diners up as they acclimatise to the evening ahead (line honours go to raw wallaby and pickled flowers in its cured egg wrapping).

Because after living through a global pandemic, we make our own rules now. We know we are only supposed to include one restaurant per spot on this list, but when you live in a city with just so much good food, you have to make a couple of exceptions here and there, so coming in hot together are Maha and Maha East. Like an older, responsible sister, Maha continues to show up just the way you want her to, providing comfort in the form of whipped hummus, slow-roasted lamb shoulder, and smoked aged rice, like an upgraded version of a familiar and warming home-cooked meal. But Maha East, her sassy, independent younger sister, who doesn’t like being told what to do, is bringing a taste of the Middle East to Chapel Street, in a carefree, fun and fresh way.

A chef, a sommelier and a maitre d’ walk into a bar. Bada-bing. Carlton Wine Room is no joke but the brilliant result of three of the industry’s accomplished stars banding together to take the leap into restaurant ownership. Snacks stand out as stars here: order the anchovy with fried bread, ricotta and pickled cucumber, and the Stracciatella with pickled mushrooms, chive oil and potato focaccia, always. 

Ishizuka's menu specialises in Japanese kaiseki. It’s also a rabbit hole, both quasi-literally (the ordeal of finding it through a nondescript door, along an arcade, down a level via a keypad and elevator and through another nondescript door, can feel a little daunting, which is probably the point) and figuratively, thanks to chef Tomotaka Ishizuka performing the food equivalent of needlepoint.

Under the stewardship of the Grossi family, this Bourke Street Italiano staple still shines. The grand Mural Room is one of Melbourne’s last bastions of lavish European dining charm where the lighting is set to dim, and the mood set upon arrival by the proffering of a handbag stool. 

There are not many ways more wondrous to while away a wintery day in Victoria than to wine and dine at the Lake House restaurant. Inextricably linked to Daylesford – which it undoubtedly helped put on the map – the Lake House is the Wolf-Taskers' enduring masterpiece that spearheaded the farm-to-table movement several decades ago, and which continues to assert its dominance in an ever-expanding landscape of regional fine diners. It's clear why the Lake House has continued to hold its place not only on prestigious awards and titles lists but also in the hearts of Victorians, for so many years. It consistently ticks all the boxes that somehow so many others seem to miss: impeccable service, which only serves to enhance the dining experience; a sophisticated yet approachable atmosphere; an expertly crafted menu of inventive dishes; deep respect for produce of the highest quality; and most importantly, beautiful and undeniably delicious food.

Cutler and Co has been a mainstay on the fickle Melbourne hospitality circuit for many years, and for good reason. Andrew McConnell opened the restaurant way back when in 2009 in a former metal works factory, and it has undergone a transformative evolution over all those years, emerging as his flagship restaurant. However Cutler and Co has stayed true to its values of refined, simple and hospitable dining throughout the years, as the industry continued to grow and evolve around it. Seasonable menus champion modern Australian food showcasing local producers and growers, expertly crafted by the skilful team in the kitchen. 

There was a time when Brunswick East threatened to throw itself into a positive feedback loop of mince and suds. Wouldn’t have sucked. Alas, it’s now more likely to be a loop of polished neighbourhood wine bars – probably the better outcome –skippered by Hannah Green’s pick-of-the-litter Etta.

Farmer’s Daughters is bringing Gippsland to the city at its swish multi-level venue at 80 Collins St. Executive chef Alejandro Saravia spent many years bringing his vision of a deli, restaurant and bar to life, and the venue was welcomed with open arms by Melburnians seeking a taste of their own state. The colour palette is inspired by gumtrees, from olive green through to terracotta, and each level of the three-storey venue represents a different location. Sink into brown leather banquettes and snack on warm Irish soda bread with cultured cream, Koo Wee Rup asparagus with black garlic and Tarago brie mousse before moving onto the likes of rabbit with Pink Fir Apple, black garlic and leek chutney or dry age O’Connor beef with Wattlebank Farm oyster mushrooms and spring brassicas. Dining at Farmer's Daughters is as much of an educational experience, as it is a luxurious, wholesome and memorable meal.

The bad news is the closing of Anchovy, otherwise known as chef Thi Le’s personal exploration of Vietnamese cuisine. The good news is its replacement by the Laos-leaning Jeow. There has been no observable change to the single Bridge Road shopfront, which remains as intimate to the point of squeezy as ever. You don’t come here for the design brilliance, but there’s also no cause for leaving before dessert thanks to the durian Swiss roll.

It fronts like Dennis Denuto’s lacklustre office in The Castle, but step through the dodgy blinds and sheisty gold lettering of this one-time legal office and things get decidedly more a la mode. You’ll see a lot of that sleight of hand at work at Gray and Gray, the fascinating brainchild of Boris Portnoy (All Are Welcome Bakery) and winemaker Mitch Sokolin that entered the cocoon a shabby law firm and left a stunning Georgian and Russian wine bar, the likes of which Melbourne has long wanted for. 

Possibly you’re here for a quick bowl of pasta and a glass of wine at the handsome marble bar. Good for you, you’re not alone. If you can afford the time, though, take it easy and consult the starters - Stracciatella, salumi, chargrilled octopus or grilled asparagus. But don't fill up before the main event: the pasta, of course. The braised duck gnocchi is a menu mainstay, for good reason, but if that's too heavy for lunch, go for something a little lighter such as the spaghettini with scallops, anchovies and gremolata. That Tipo 00 is one of the country’s best carb bars is not new news. That it continues to excite after this many years is cause for celebration. Tipo 00 is the kind of restaurant you want to show off to visitors, the kind of place that makes you proud to call Melbourne home.

Welcome to Tonka, where chef Adam D’Sylva and partners have conclusively proven Indian food was ready for its fine dining close-up. Since all the way back in 2013, Tonka has introduced Melbourne to a new side of Indian fine dining, celebrating the vibrancy of Indian flavours, techniques and dishes. Executive Chef Adam D’Sylva champions his family recipes to recreate classics while focusing on clean and bold flavours. Two Tandoor ovens are at the heart of the kitchen and are responsible for the melt-in-your-mouth tandoori ocean trout. Never skip the burrata cheese with fresh coriander relish and charred roti – it is life-changing. 

Did ‘fusion’ really ever leave? Was it merely masquerading as ‘new-style’ all along? And when it’s this delicious, does it even matter? These are the hard-hitting questions you must ponder at Victor Liong’s time-honoured, pan-Asian institution Lee Ho Fook. At this Melbourne favourite Australian producers and grocers, and seasonal ingredients, are championed through a platform of modern Chinese food. Perhaps it'll be Tasmanian ocean trout sashimi with black bean and orange dressing to start, followed by the lacquered duck with quince hoisin, spring onion, and bing bread, all capped off with a rose tea and red fruit trifle with vanilla and osmanthus cream. Whatever you eat, it is sure to be excellent. 

This is a kitchen bringing the kind of modern Turkish food you’d find in Istanbul’s vigorous restaurant scene to Balaclava with a program of pickling, preserving, fermenting and hanging (yoghurt, that is). It’s fresh, pretty, textured and refined. 

Scott Pickett has built his reputation on a jazz-riff approach to Michelin classicism, but here he’s favouring the visceral attractions of smoke, flame and char. The elemental approach to cooking goes hand-in-hand with the strictly a la carte menu and a pragmatic wine list that will please both the haves and the have-yachts.

The tiny bluestone building on the corner of Napier and Kerr Streets in Fitzroy has had a few businesses pass through over the years, mostly average cafés that couldn’t last long enough to warm the hearth – but it seems that wine and espresso bar Napier Quarter has found its forever home. Inside, there’s only room for a few tables and a couple of narrow benches. A big chalkboard on the high brick wall lists the wines of the day, and pastries beckon from a case on the counter. While Brunswick and Smith Streets get increasingly raucous and corporate, these in-between blocks and their unassuming little venues still hold the charm that makes Fitzroy world famous. It's almost enough to make the rent worth it. Did you know there is also a luxe and comfortable guest house attached?

What we have here is not so humble as an osteria. Sure, it has an underlying rustic Italian brief, exemplified by the chargrilled whole octopus brutishly splayed over a sauce made of the fiery Calabrian spreadable salami, `nduja. Despite its aims to be everything but a pasta bar, Ilaria's signature has become a plate of paccheri (thick tubes of pasta) strewn with nubs of Crystal Bay prawn meat, grounded in tomato and sorrel purees and anointed with the heady cologne of prawn oil.

It’s the roti with Vegemite curry, OK? This Punch Lane spot is renowned for making the most spectacular play for the hearts of Melbourne with a crazy-brave combination of buttery deconstructed roti and a curry sauce with a Vegemite-umami backbone.

Marion is another one of Andrew McConnell's Gertrude Street institutions, and even though it’s right next door to Cutler and Co, it has become a Melbourne favourite in its own right. It is cosy and warm and makes for a perfect first date night spot. It's also a popular local hangout and for good reason. There’s always plenty on at Marion – great food, excellent wine and an often changing menu. The mussels and 'nduja have blessedly been hanging in from the start, and you are almost guaranteed to see the flatbread served with fromage blanc, being delivered to each table. A whole flounder or roast chook are the comfort in food form that we all need. 

When young Abla Amad came to Melbourne in 1954 she brought the love of cooking developed while watching her mother in their north Lebanese village. Later, she sharpened her culinary skills with the Lebanese women who would meet in each other’s kitchens to exchange recipes. Abla loved feeding people so much that meal-making for her family turned into hosting Sunday feasts for the community – and then came the restaurant. It’s easy to see why this has been a Carlton institution for 40 years. There’s no pomp or pretence here – it's so authentic it should come with a certificate. Places like Abla’s are not just about a good feed. They are part of the fabric of our city, and in these days of hyped new openings, it's important to celebrate this rare breed of restaurant.

Hi Chong Qing is the first venture from restaurateur Kevin Houng, who spent some time in Chongqing learning the art of making a good bowl of noodles from a master who has been honing his craft for 26 years. Fresh and springy wheat flour noodles, a mouth-numbing broth due to the inclusion of Sichuan peppercorns, and toppings ranging from intestines to pork feet are features of a traditional bowl of Chongqing noodles, but Houng has swapped out the spiciness for a more subtle level of heat and the offal with more conventional meat cuts. In a departure from traditional meat-heavy versions, the ‘signature Chongqing noodles’ can be made in a vegetarian version if requested. The heady and restorative broth, whether veggo or reduced down from pork bones, is concocted from ten ingredients that include clearly discernible notes of garlic, ginger, coriander, spring onion, soy, chilli and, of course, Sichuan peppercorns. Don’t venture near these noodles with a white shirt, or without a serviette bib – these slurpable oily noodles are messy and they will stain.

We’re at the end of the line. Literally – the end of the Hurstbridge Line, a 50-minute train ride out of the CBD, is where you’ll find a cool rustic bolthole big enough for an open kitchen, vinyl spinning turntable and just 15 seats. It feels less like a conventional restaurant, and more like you’ve accidentally wandered into the bijou farmhouse of someone with really good taste.

When a 20-seater restaurant in the heart of suburbia that only offers a few dishes, with no bookings, no website and no advertising is never with an empty seat, you know it has to be good. Mr Lee’s Foods is well worth the trip to Ringwood if you’re a fan of pork; all dishes are derived from the animal, offering an insight into the economical traditions of Korean dining, utilising an unconscious, innately cultural nose-to-tail philosophy. Venture outside of the city grid, prepare yourself to try something different and you’ll be rewarded with the perfect simplicity of Korean comfort food.

There are two kinds of people in Melbourne, those who have heard of Aangan, and those who have not. For the uninitiated, Aangan is the over 15-year-old, well-oiled machine serving multiregional Indian cuisine to the local community and anyone determined enough to travel for their near-flawless food. It may be overwhelming on your first visit because Aangan is the kind of venue where they’re full from the minute they open until the minute they close, but the staff are so used to the controlled chaos that they never miss a beat. The menu spans India, and even a little beyond with chaat and biryani from the north, dosa, idli and sambhar from the south, plus a range of fried noodles and rice, reflective of the neighbouring influences from further east. Aangan’s dosa comes plain or filled with paneer, onion or ghee masala. All come with a coconut chutney, tomato chutney and a bowl of sambhar used to accompany the table-sized scroll of tangy, fermented ground rice and lentils cooked to a paper-thin, tuille-like crisp. Curries here possess a liveliness, no matter how heavy they may read. Against regular restaurant logic of shorter menus equating to all-around, excellent food, Aangan manages an 11-page tome where everything is cooked with precision and perfection.

ShanDong MaMa is aptly-named. For those not already in the know, this is the place to be for home-style Shandong cuisine courtesy of Meiyan Wang (aka Mama). The little dumpling haven sits hidden away in a tunnel of shops and continues to dish up some of the city's finest doughy snacks. The dumplings come classic, and a little different – try the ever-popular mackerel dumplings or the Aussie lamb version. No matter which way you dumpling at ShanDong MaMa, you can't go wrong. 

While Footscray is known for its African food, if you head a little closer towards the city to the Abyssinian for your dose of injera bread, you won't be disappointed. 

This Racecourse Road eatery serves up a combo of traditional and spiced-up Ethiopian dishes including kifto beef, goat with kemmam sauce and the lamb hot pot shiro bozena. Order the mixed platter feast to get a chef's choice of curries and a small salad served on a giant serve of delightfully spongy injera flatbread. Cutlery is barred here, so get your hands in there and sop up all the flavours.