10 of the best places to eat in Melbourne right now

27.09.2024 - 14:31 / lonelyplanet.com / Anthony Bourdain

Sep 26, 2024 • 6 min read

The late, great Anthony Bourdain once said he’d rather eat in Melbourne than Paris. Who can blame him? Australia’s cultural and sporting capital is also one of the world’s most dynamic epicurean destinations, one shaped by superlative local produce, rockstar chefs, and the multicultural traditions of its 5.3 million denizens.

Much of my professional and personal life is spent chowing around Australia and the globe, and I’m forever amazed by the breadth, depth and quality of my hometown’s culinary offerings. And that’s before we even mention the coffee and cocktails. Peckish? Parched? Add these personal favorites to your Melbourne hitlist.

Melburnians take breakfast seriously and the all-day breakfast menus at Melbourne cafes are often next level. A case in point is Top Paddock. Years on, it still draws crowds with its buzz, good looks and creative, sustainably minded dishes (reserve a table on weekends to avoid a long wait). My standard order is the blueberry and ricotta hotcake – soft, fluffy and topped with crunchy seeds, maple syrup and double cream. If the rest of my morning is free, I like to wander across Church Street Bridge and drop by the Prahran Market, a food lovers’ wonderland trading since 1864.

How to get it: The all-day breakfast runs from 7am-4pm, Monday to Friday and from 8am-4pm on weekends.

For something altogether different, start the day at Brunswick West’s Lankan Tucker, an upbeat, light-filled café where breakfast gets the Sri Lankan treatment. Top billing goes to the turmeric-laced Hip Hopper, a crispy, bowl-shaped ‘crêpe’ plonked with a soft-fried egg and paired with your choice of aromatic curry. Like Top Paddock, the locally roasted coffee is excellent, though it’s hard to pass up on the brownie-pimped iced Milo, a glass of malty nostalgia for many Aussies.

How to get it: Walk-ins are welcome, though you might want to book on weekends.

Coffee is a veritable religion in Melbourne and you’ll find no shortage of exemplary micro roasters. In Downtown (known as the Central Business District or CBD), slurp at Bench Coffee Co. While it’s far from the only top-notch coffee joint in the area, it’s the only one with a glass-block counter inspired by a Parisian Modernist building (Maison de Verre). For an effervescent recharge, order their creamy espresso tonic. Around the corner is Block Arcade, an exquisitely mosaicked 19th-century shopping arcade inspired by Milan’s Galleria Vittorio Emmanuele II.

How to get it: It's open from 8am Monday to Friday, and from 9am on weekends.

Eating out in Melbourne isn’t cheap. That said, a smashing feed south of $20 isn’t impossible, especially for lunch. In the CBD, Warkop peddles mouthwatering sandwiches with Indonesian twists,