Bar Margaux: Good Food Guide Awards Bar of the year 2020

Bar Margaux was crowned bar of the year for 2020 in the Good Food Guide Awards.

It is buzzing with bonhomie and spare seats are few and far between.

What comes first – the chicken or the egg? Accolades aside, this has been on the lips of savvy diners and wine enthusiasts – and extremely popular – since its opening in July last year, and the “best bar” crown for the new year really only confirms its status.

Bar Margaux, from the team behind Fitzroy cocktail lounge The Everleigh, is timeless dining that speaks to Melbourne’s European leanings and, better still, it is open late.

Welcoming and helpful staff sashay between tables with plates of chips (seek out “frites” on the menu) and negronis until all hours. First guests are welcomed at 4pm and can stay until 3am.

From midnight until close there is a special menu, including $29 servings of oysters and champagne, or a burger paired with a glass of burgundy. At $99, the Beggar’s Banquet of champagne, oysters, steak tartare and frites will keep night owls sated until the sun comes up.

Margaux is an especially excellent venue for post-theatre tipples and shared nibbles – choose your preferred position, either coddled in a rouge leather banquette or leaning close to a paramour across a table.

The entrance is cleverly concealed, speakeasy-style, and yet the drama starts on the Lonsdale Street footpath.

Hovering above steps that lead to the basement bar is a digital screen of a hand sensuously toying with a bottle of wine.

It’s sexy here but unpretentious. The low light inside amplifies the lively atmosphere within the New York-meets-Parisian-style brasserie, homely yet swank with subway tiles, warm wood and the golden glow of the main bar.

Embrace the scene and start with escargots de bourgogne (curls of juicy snails swimming in a ramekin of garlic butter), a quenelle of melt-in-the-mouth steak tartare (scooped onto waffle frites) and the generous charcuterie spread.

Main plates are a meaty affair (filet de boeuf, roasted Bannockburn chicken, Humpty Doo barramundi), save for plump little Parisienne gnocchis.

However, duck as a main is a must – because … when in Paris. Slices of duck meat carry the same perfect blush you might spot on the cheeks of a young couple having a cosy date night on a neighbouring table and, being rich as duck is, it’s ideal to share.

Delicious sides are an uncomplicated choice – saving the debate for the drinks list – offering a green salad, sauteed spinach or the must-have frites, if you unwisely skipped them earlier.

The dessert portion of the menu teases with the title: Should I Stay or Should I Gaux? Surely the only option is to linger a while longer over a souffle of the day.

Bar Margaux \ Basement, 111 Lonsdale Street, Melbourne.

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