Shane Delia’s Jazzy Collingwood Spot, Maha Bar, Is the Good-Time Sibling to Flagship Maha

The first thing you’ll see when you step into Maha Bar is the cork-topped bar. It’s a nod to Shane Delia’s father’s home bar, which the chef-owner remembers from his childhood.

The version at Delia’s jazzy Collingwood spot is made from champagne corks, its lightly lacquered surface shining in the gentle light from the oversized globes overhead.

You can pull up a stool here and peruse imported bottles of raki and arak (anise-flavoured spirits), or get one of the house infusions (cola, elderflower, coconut, blackcurrant) served neat or on ice. There’s also the Turkish Delight Martini and the Pomegranate Sour, a signature carried over from Delia’s flagship Middle Eastern restaurant Maha (you’ll also find it at sibling wine bar Maha East).

“We’ve always founded our Maha pillars on my family’s coat of arms, Fortis et hospitalis, which means ‘strength through hospitality’,” Delia says. “It’s deep in my DNA.”

The kitchen is separated from the dining room by a wall of retro reeded glass. Inside, Delia and his team are making borek buns: sweet sesame doughnuts filled with braised beef (which you can get for free throughout February) or eggplant, with an intense toasted-coconut and harissa curry dotted on top.

“It’s pretty much a borek, which is a traditional Turkish baked pastry of crisp, fluffy bread filled with meat or eggplant or cheese,” Delia says. “But we’re doing them filled and frying them.”

A plate of stuffed Portarlington mussels in a tomato and clove broth is a spin on a Turkish dish called midye dolma. “You get it on the street in Turkey, it goes great with a cold beer,” Delia says. “We serve the mussels out of the shell, and stuff them with fragrant rice.”

Vine-ripened tomatoes are cut to order, served with a preserved-lemon dressing and macadamia cream. Rolls of thinly sliced Wagyu basturma (cured beef) arrive alongside spoonfuls of fresh ricotta. And hobz bil zejit, which roughly translates to “bread with oil”, is a Maltese classic: Baker Bleu bread topped with tomato paste, anchovies, dehydrated olive, pickled onion, chives and salted ricotta.

“The more I look at the food here, even though it’s not traditional, it’s probably the most traditional we’ve done,” Delia says. “So many things have a direct relationship with Middle Eastern food.”

As at Maha, there’s a 12-hour lamb shoulder, here heavily spiced with baharat, a blend of coriander, cinnamon, clove, black pepper and paprika. It sits on a roasted eggplant salad, with makanek (lamb sausage) and a date-and-lamb-fat sauce.

Other large plates include duck – the breast roasted, the leg braised – with muhammara (a spicy roasted capsicum and walnut dip); chickpea and garlic dumplings with toum (garlic sauce) and sumac grown by Delia’s father (“it’s almost like a Barbecue Shapes flavour”); crinkle cut chips with taramasalata; and a pilaf made using five-year-aged Persian rice with little jewels of dried apricot, coriander seeds and crispy rice folded through. A soufra menu lets you try a few different things for $65 (there’s a vegan option, too).

If you’re not able to nab a spot at the bar, there are cosy, khaki-leather banquettes and bistro chairs set around cork-topped tables. Wood panelling on the walls is offset by vibrant artwork by French-Lebanese artist Raphaelle Macaron, whose brightly coloured pieces celebrate elements of Lebanese and Arabic cooking, and reference old Lebanese advertisements.

“The dining room is beautiful,” says Delia. “But it’s the people, the art and the music that bring the attitude."

Maha Bar
86 Smith Street, Collingwood
(03) 9417 3531

Hours:
Tue to Sat 5pm–10pm

mahabar.com.au