Your guide to Australian craft spirits & Melbourne's cocktail culture
Happy Negroni Week! In ode to that holy trinity of Campari, gin and vermouth, the festival is basically a bittersweet excuse to drink marginally more negronis than usual (plus you might find unique takes on the classic recipe on offer at certain venues). Each tipple counts with $1 from each negroni […]
Last year, Project Botanicals – one of the most promising concepts of 2014 – served up a staggering 13,500+ cocktails (and four lonely beers?!) After such success the pop-up bar returns to Melbourne next month. “It’s basically a celebration of the botanicals, or herbs and spices, used to create Bombay Sapphire […]
Mod Vietnamese restaurant The Brass Coq (the place used to be called Dikstein’s Side Bar so the irreverent naming convention has stuck) a.k.a TBC opened in March. So it’s fitting that the name of their new upstairs bar – officially opening to the public today – will be ‘to be […]
World Class Cocktail Week is but one week away. This celebration of all things shaken or stirred includes full on degustation dinners to short and sweet paired bites. Some events focus on old fashioneds, martinis and bloody marys. Some will give a general history lesson (for which you’ll actually want […]
The renowned and often illusive mixologist and artist Matt Bax (Bar Americano, Bar Economico & Bar Exuberante) revealed his secrets to mastering classic cocktails at an Essentials class at the most recent Melbourne Food and Wine Festival. On the merit of going back to the classics “it’s like cooking, once you […]
The Underground Experiment continues. The basement of The Noble Experiment was temporarily a kitsch 80s/90s hidden bar awash with neon. But now we’re saying ‘Aloha Sailor‘ as the space turns tropically tiki. For now anyway. The decor pays homage to 1930’s pioneers like Trader Vic and Don the Beachcomber. Creepy […]
Glamping (noun): A form of camping involving accommodation and facilities more luxurious than those associated with traditional camping. Early 21st century blend of glamorous and camping. And all of a sudden the activity that is “glamping” is part of the Zeitgeist. The recent Beyond the Valley music festival offered jacuzzis, […]
There is so much more to discover than malt, head and hops at Good Beer Week. Here’s your handy guide to the events on the 2015 GBW line-up where beer happily shares the spotlight… Beer Cocktail Degustation – 1806/The Understudy – Saturday 16 to 23 May, 7.30pm Here’s a cocktail degustation that […]
Way back when I was a wee budding scribe one of my first assignments for (the fab yet now defunct) Drink Magazine was profiling The Saint. The heritage building was once a bank and the vaults remained. But my how times have changed. The space within the familiar heritage façade […]
The Mornington Peninsula’s Bass & Flinders Distillery have just released the debut vintage of what they are dubbing Australia’s first Cognac-style aged spirit (as with sparkling from Champagne, spirits from outside the French locality can’t technically be referred to as Cognac). It goes by the evocatively apt name of “Ochre“. […]