Clara Luna serves bar food, but it’s also soul food; Middle Eastern and South American, but also Australian.
14/20
Middle Eastern$$
It’s Thursday night in Preston, late summer, and trivia night at Jamsheed Wines is in full swing. It’s the Kylie Minogue round – a nod to the singer’s concert happening that same night a few kilometres away – and while I’m not officially playing, I can’t help but follow along and wonder if I know how many times Kylie has been married. (Answer: zero.)
In front of me is a glass of the winery’s Candy Flip, a fizzy, soft, immensely drinkable pet nat that showed up at half the picnics in Melbourne a few years back. A young, affable waiter arrives carrying a plate of golden chips topped with squishy, rich mtabak, a fudgy Syrian eggplant dish that’s a little bit sweet and profoundly satisfying.
This is bar food but also soul food, Middle Eastern but also Australian, if only thanks to its context – made to complement Australian wine in a deeply Australian setting. It’s casual, fun, international eating and drinking. The mash-up makes me giddy. This is home.
Jamsheed, which has been operating as a wine label since 2003 and a winery venue in Preston since 2019, has the kind of quirky set-up born of turning industrial spaces into ones that might welcome guests.
There’s a patio with beer garden vibes in front, then a couple of rooms that act as lounge-like dining areas (along with a pool table) affectionately called the “dive bar”, then, down a staircase, the place opens onto a huge hangar-like space full of the barrels and huge tanks of wine production, but that also has a bar and lots of seating, plants and twinkling string lights.
Late last year, chef Frankie Hadid took over the kitchen, and Clara Luna launched at the beginning of January as a residence and semi-permanent pop-up. Hadid was raised in Venezuela by Syrian parents, and the food at Clara Luna is inspired by both cultures.
If this seems like an odd pairing on paper, on the table it works incredibly well. Most dishes lean one way or another – there’s not a lot of straight-up fusion – but with nods to an ingredient or cooking method that reaches across cultures.
There’s classic lamb shish – skewers of lamb with yoghurt and mint – and also arepas, the thick pancake-like corn-based South American snack that is here served with guasacaca, a tart and addictive sauce made from coriander, lime and avocado. Tahini is used in various ingenious ways: in a tarator sauce atop fried fish wings; as subtle flavouring for a simple scoop of tiramisu.
There’s a fruit plate that feels like an adventure (hardy kiwifruit! Star fruit! Something like a mangosteen but not exactly!). Grilled chicken with tomatillo salsa will indoctrinate you to the cult of South American chicken magic.
Hadid has touted the “pipis and chippies” as a signature dish, and I’ve had it once when I thought it was worthy of that title – all briny and juicy and excellent – and once when the pipis were a bit overdone, the sauce less magical, the dish less lovable. I’m not deterred. I’ll order it again.
There are some things you should consider: the menu shrinks a bit on Thursdays, given that it’s trivia night (though there’s a happy hour to make up for it); the staff are so very lovely but do get overwhelmed; this is a place to come if you want something genuine and don’t fuss too much about formalities.
In other words: don’t arrive expecting anything other than a lovely group of people doing their best to give you some food and drink that is likely to make you happy.
But honestly, what more could you possibly want?
The low-down
Atmosphere: Laid-back urban winery
Go-to dishes: Fish wings ($22), mtabak ($25), arepas ($16)
Drinks: Smart cocktails, Jamsheed wines, small beer selection
Cost: About $110, excluding drinks
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