The Auswine Forum

Good evening! I've been circling these forums for a while, but this is my first post. Hello everyone!

I'm travelling to Melbourne for the F1 in March, and will be getting there a few days early to take in the sights, the golf courses, and of course, the wineries and restaurants!

We'll be based in the Melbourne CBD, and there will be four of us. Are there any wine tours that we can get to for a few lunch tours? (transport required, obviously!)? We'd also consider lunching at a restaurant with a decent winelist if there's nothing worthwhile seeing locally.

Any suggestions for evening dining appreciated: CBD through Albert Park would be best!

Thanks in advance for any answers!

Book well in advance for the better restaurants is my advice for that time of year.

What kind of spend and food style are you thinking? Does it need to be BYO?

there's a few threads on this topic with fantastic suggestions if you do a quick search

It does depend how far you want to travel, and whether you wnat to drive or be driven. There are plenty of tours up to the Yarra Valley that do lunch.

It touch further away; you could head down to Geelong and either go to Pettavel just west of Geelong; or Julians at Bellarine Estate along the Bellarine Estate, both of which serve really great food along with great wines. There's a few wineries to drop into as well.

To get there you could do the designated driver; or catch the train and get a tour/limo/taxi from there to the place and back.

in the CBD i would recommend Cecconi, 61 Flinders lane - i remember one of the waiter told me that, the Ferrari team dine there in one occasion - so make sure you book well in advance, you can also try Il Bacaro in Lt Collins. If you like nice & reasonable Japanese food - try Akita in North Melbourne - this restaurant does not open during weekend (i'd steer clear of Koko at the crown complex btw).

Wineries dining - i'd try Mitchelton i only i had lunch there a couple of times so i'm not sure about their diner menu.

I'd also would recommend The Lake House in Daylesford.

there are a lot more, but it depends on your favourite cuisine, there's an award wining French restaurant Vue De Mond(?) in Carlton, and the Botanical - but i haven't been to any of these

Cheers - and welcome to Melbourne .

Would be worth checking out events in Melbourne while you there.
Check out the melbournefoodandwine website (google it). Also the Red Hill Cool Climate Wineshow has a public tasting Mornington Peninsula on the 5 March. There are many good restaurants in Melbourne, however hard to get good BYOs n the centre. I'm working/living in Melb at the moment inner city, we took our own wine to Oyster in Little Bourke the other day, food was great. They have a good wine list also. And if you get there between 5.30 and 6.30, there is a happy hour on oysters (half price) with a choice of how you want them.

Interlude in Fitzroy was quite a good experience. Fantastic service and the food was v. good. Had a very enjoyable degustation experience

Also had an enjoyable lunch experience at Caterina's on Queen St. Excellent, friendly service, great Italian food. We had a lot of fun and made to feel very welcome. It felt as if we were dining with friends and family.

Circa at the Prince of Wales also very good.

If you were looking to do a wine tour to Mornington Peninsula I WOULD NOT recommend Max's at Red Hill Estate. Had quite a disappointing experience when we went for lunch. How this won American Expresses' Restaurant of the year in Victoria is beyond me!(Actually do AE's awards actually mean anything?)

The service was well below average and I found the food on average to be quite ordinary - well the courses I ordered. I had the calamari for entree and eye fillet for main. The calamari was a mess of deep fried, congealed, over-spiced batter, though the calamari itself was good. The fillet over cooked - shame as it looked a nice piece of meat. My partner fared much better, she ordered twice from the entree's, the antipasto plater and salmon for main - both were v.good/good.

Positives - had a fantastic table with great unobstructed views. I also enjoyed their wines. Shiraz was good, but was really impressed with their cabernet.

The service was probably my biggest gripe. We had an older waitress who was generally distracted and unattentive. Half taking orders(she walked off before I had ordered my main and had to call her back), taking our bread plates at the start then remembering we hadn't received our bread half way through our main course and resetting the table for bread! A few other things happened which I felt were rather unprofessional.

I guess when you're paying for a fine dining/5 star experience and you only receive the bistro/pub deal it's always going to be disappointing.