Newcomer Bar Elsie is serving a menu of pure comfort, including cheesy baked gnocchi, a crumbed pork chop and mash made to grandmaâs recipe. This is your first look.
Daniela Frangos
Seasoned Sydney venue operators Brett and Susie Pritchard (previously behind Ronâs Upstairs, Redfern Continental and Arcadia Liquors) were visiting Melbourne when Brett suffered a near-fatal heart attack at URBNSURF wave park in Tullamarine.
After recuperating at a friendâs place in Brunswick, they decided to reset, purchasing that friendâs house and moving here permanently. Now the couple is doubling down on the neighbourhood, opening their first Melbourne venue on the northern end of Lygon Street. And itâs their biggest endeavour yet.
âThis is something we havenât done before,â says Brett, who worked stints at the Builders Arms Hotel and City Wine Shop after landing in Melbourne.
The spacious site, previously Alchemy Brewing Co, has opened gradually. Stage one was The Coffee Bar, an adjoining sandwich shop in the breweryâs former loading dock.
Stage two is Bar Elsie, which opened last week: a nostalgic neighbourhood bistro named for Brettâs late grandmother, who lived in Hawthorn.
âOne of the first things I did when I moved down here was go and look at her old flat,â says Brett. âShe was a tough cookie. She [wore] these big Coke-bottle glasses ⊠she also made the best mashed potato.â That mash graces the menu at Bar Elsie, made âwith a tremendous amount of full cream milk, full fat butter and white pepper,â says Susie.
Normandy-born chef Edmee Driez (ex-Three Blue Ducks) has assembled a Euro-leaning menu of deeply comforting dishes.
Italian inspiration is found in starters such as coccoli (literally âcuddlesâ in Italian), which are Florentine fried bread balls made for swiping through whipped ricotta and wrapping in serrano ham. Slices of cheesy Roman gnocchi, distinct from its potato-based cousin, are made with semolina and pecorino, and baked in the oven.
Bistro-style mains include Driezâs spin on fish đnđ chips â mirror Dory fillet in beurre blanc with salt-and-vinegar crisps and rainbow chard â and crumbed pork chop on the bone. The 300-gram rib-eye is brined in apple cider vinegar for 24 hours, cooked in clarified butter, and paired with fresh horseradish and a radicchio-and-celery remoulade.
âItâs a neighbourhood restaurant,â says Susie, who previously worked at Spring St Grocer. âIf you come from St Kilda, thatâs awesome, but itâs homey, itâs simple. Itâs food we all like to eat and cook at home for friends and family.â
Even the fitout is deeply personal. Brett made the light sconces out of wooden plates, and found most of the furniture on Facebook Marketplace â including the bar top and kitchen pass. Theyâre made from the old Ballarat tenpin bowling alley and capped with Tasmanian oak, the work of Curve Build & Design (The Sporting Club, Royal Oak Hotel).
âWe wanted it to feel like youâve been invited around to your friendâs house and thereâs a picture of their grandmother and next to it is a Keith Haring [artwork],â says Susie.
Dropping in for a cold beer at the sweeping U-shaped bar is welcomed. Taps are pouring everything from Carlton Draught to Venomâs cherry sour, plus there are classic cocktails such as Daiquiris, with plans to expand the list.
Lunch Sun, dinner Wed-Sun
396 Lygon Street, Brunswick East, instagram.com/barelsie_
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