Snack Bar: Lune’s Konbini Collab, a New Opening for Chris Lucas, and More Local Food News

What’s happening around town

• Melbourne’s favourite croissanterie has teamed up with konbini-restaurant concept Suupaa on three limited-edition creations. The Negiyaki pastry remixes Lune’s escargot through the lens of the Osakan pancake. Get it with the Lune-cha, a blend of Uji genmaicha and matcha, with oat milk, yuzu cream and caramel made from croissant offcuts. There’s also a cute keychain by Melbourne studio A Friend of Mine, combining Suupaa’s puffer fish logo with Lune’s croissant-tailed rocket ship. Available now until Monday April 27 at Suupaa in Cremorne and all Lune locations.

• This Saturday is the final night for Sebastian Pasinetti’s Paella Party. Catch the chef and Broadsheet contributor cooking live over an open fire at paddock-to-plate bistro Fenton Farmhouse, with DJs and snacks from 5pm and the main course from 6pm. It’s walk-ins only for this generous, share-style meal, and the most you’ll pay for a dish is $26.

• Having just celebrated its 10th birthday, Canberra’s acclaimed Bar Rochford is making a one-night-only appearance in Melbourne. The bar – known not only for its drinks list and produce-driven small plates but for its record collection and impeccable vibes – pops up at the new Geralds space on Tuesday May 5. Owner Nick Smith and venue manager Ryan Smith will take over the bar and the decks, while head chef Alisdair Brooke-Taylor pumps out a $95 set menu. Reservations are open now.

• Bar Marmelo, the drop-in bar at Ross and Sunny Lusted’s Marmelo restaurant on Russell Street, has a new happy hour offering. Lisbon Nights runs from 4pm to 6pm Tuesday through Saturday, with $9 aperitifs and $14 cocktails. Portuguese pre-dinner staples, like port and tonic, and madeira with ginger beer, are running alongside new signature drink the Porticano: a twist on an Americano with port, bitter liqueurs and Ginjinha, a dark cherry liqueur made expressly for Bar Marmelo by Altona North’s White Possum Distillery.

• The team at Morning Market has added a cosy Stephanie Alexander classic to the menu for a short time only. “Chicken in the pot with tarragon cream sauce”, from the 30th-anniversary edition of Alexander’s Cook’s Companion, has been adapted into a rich pie filling, topped with house-made puff pastry. Individual pies are available warm for $12 from Fitzroy only, or you can get a larger take-home pie (served in an enamel pie dish for you to keep after heating) from Fitzroy or Prahran for $42. Available until Sunday May 3.

• Choose-your-own-adventure pasta bar Pasta Prego is launching a third outpost, in Carlton, after successfully expanding from Chapel Street to Hawthorn’s Glenferrie Road last year. The pasta is free for the first 350 people through the door on opening day, Sunday April 26, with all remaining bowls going for $10 until close of business. From midday, 223 Lygon Street, Carlton.

• Margot Robbie’s gin label Papa Salt joins sibling-run olive oil company Golden Groves for a pop-up at Docklands’ 1 Hotel Melbourne. Part of the hotel’s Upstairs Pour series, it’ll feature DJs and small plates matched with olive oil-infused gin cocktails, plus a roaming dessert trolley. Tickets to the April 29 event are on sale now. 

• Melbourne-born premium pepper company Pep has a punchy new collab with Tasmanian fermenter extraordinaire Adam James, aka Rough Rice. The zingy Borscht & Black Pepper seasoning is made from an eight-year wild-fermented borscht soup that’s been freeze-dried and cut with Pep’s single-origin Cambodian pepper, with a little black cumin and sea salt to boot. Each 60-gram jar is $25. There are only 300 available, so be quick. 

What we covered this week

• At its brand-new location, this innovative Japandi bakery is doing super-crisp shio pan, and everything-bagel scrolls with honey, sea salt and whipped goat’s cheese.

• Chris Lucas expands into Chinese food with a new concept inspired by Hong Kong’s eccentric small restaurants and street-food stalls. 

• The drinks at this clever, botanical-driven cocktail bar above steak frites joint 7 Alfred draw on the work of an influential 19th-century botanist. 

• Speaking of steak frites, here are five of Melbourne’s best for less than $50.

• Details are scant for Rosheen Kaul’s forthcoming Fitzroy pop-up with acclaimed bartender Joe Jones – but bookings are already being snapped up.

• The team behind Bar Kaeru hopes to make Melbourne fall in love with saké.  

• Melbourne’s banh mi wars level up with a CBD opening where everything is made from scratch.

• The Brunswick Street institution that turned down Jerry Seinfeld without a second thought commemorates 40 years with a free publication filled with photographs, stories and personal memories.