In the words of Charli XCX, it’s hard being ahead. But when Peruvian-born chef Alejandro Saravia opened his first restaurant in Australia back in 2011, he was exactly that.

Morena, as the restaurant was called, was groundbreaking because it was one of the first to push upscale Latin American food into the Australian mainstream. But it didn’t find its groove, and closed in 2013.

The food and drink landscape in Australia has evolved significantly since then, as has Saravia’s career. He’s since opened Farmer’s Daughters, a three-storey love letter to Gippsland on Exhibition Street, and Victoria by Farmer’s Daughters, a Fed Square bar that showcases the best of the state’s food, drink and art. But Saravia’s passion for Latin American cuisine has never waned.

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In April he rebooted Morena – a term sometimes used to describe brown-haired women in Latin America – and opened a new version of the restaurant in Sydney. On Monday September 2 he’ll officially open Morena Melbourne on Little Collins Street, just around the corner from Farmer’s Daughters.

He says there have been many learning curves since opening the first iteration in 2011, but that the time is right for the approach he’s taking now. Australians are far more familiar with Latin American dishes and ingredients now. Saravia also sees the project as an important educational tool.

“We want to work with dishes not overly exposed in Latin American cuisine [in Australia],” he says. “We’ve taken authentic recipes, broken them down and replicated them with the most accuracy possible in the restaurant environment and far away from the country of origin.”

The Morena menu draws not just on Saravia’s heritage but his team’s too – there’s influence from Venezuela, Colombia, Chile and Argentina.

Lunch and dinner are a $140 degustation, or an a la carte menu of dishes including suckling goat with mole (a Mexican staple sauce) and blue corn tostadas. And seared marlin ceviche with tamarillo (a slightly savoury tomato-shaped fruit) and coconut tiger’s milk (a spicy Peruvian citrus-based marinade). There’s also palm heart, an ingredient hard to find fresh in Australia, sourced from a farm in Queensland and served with a fermented palm heart sauce made from its refuse.

At Morena Barra, the venue’s more casual offshoot which Saravia likens to a Latin American wine bar, things get a bit more playful. Each menu item is labelled by country of origin. You’ll find Chilean smoked mussels, Venezuelan spanner crab arepas with avocado and trout roe, and Mexican jelly made from hibiscus flower topped with macerated seasonal fruit.

Many dishes rely on time-tested preparation methods like preservation and fermentation, but Saravia is not a traditionalist. “We wanted to showcase the innovation that is happening in Latin American restaurants in Latin America.”

The beverage list is also a showcase of the region. There’s a range of pisco-based cocktails and a wine list dominated by South American varietals known as criolla and minimal-intervention producers using clay pot fermentation.

But Saravia’s love for Melbourne isn’t lost. The Tulum-inspired interiors are awash with Latin-inspired works commissioned by local artists including lino prints by Kristian Leombruni and murals by Nathalia Suizi.

“Morena has been a life-long project for me,” says Saravia. “It symbolises the 360-degree circle of first introducing Latin American and Peruvian cuisine to the Australian food market.

“It’s the cherry on top of the cake to finally say Latin American cuisine [has] the stage and degree of professionalism it deserves.”

Morena
71 Little Collins Street, Melbourne
9654 6322

Hours:
Morena
Mon to Sat midday–3pm; 5.30pm–late

Morena Barra
Daily midday–late

morenarestaurant.com.au/melbourne