Melbourne’s king of dips is bringing again some Bar Saracen favourites plus a brand new Lebanese brunch menu constructed for days spent on a rooftop on the tennis.
Melbourne’s favorite nomadic chef and hummus maestro, Tom Sarafian, will likely be serving Lebanese brunch and bar snacks on the Australian Open 2024, paired with cocktails from main Fitzroy bar The Everleigh.
Sarafian, who was head chef at CBD restaurant Bar Saracen, a sibling to long-running Center Jap restaurant Rumi till Saracen closed in early 2021, says his menu for the tennis will likely be “enjoyable, simple, shareable and really appropriate for the situations”.
From January 14 to twenty-eight, he’ll be cooking at Melbourne Park’s common Bar Atrium, which will likely be open to the general public during the match for the primary time subsequent yr.
The indoor-outdoor venue, which has a rooftop that provides views of the Yarra River and metropolis skyline, has beforehand hosted Attica chef Ben Shewry cooking rooster souvlaki and lasagne, in addition to Flinders Lane restaurant Nomad, and Melbourne chef-restaurateur Scott Pickett.
Sarafian’s three-course brunch will kick off with crudites and baba ghanoush, a foretaste of a dip he’s including to his Sarafian retail vary, plus pickles and labne with Mount Zero olive oil.
For mains, diners will be capable to select between ful medames (a broad bean stew based mostly on his grandmother’s recipe), eggs fried in confit lamb fats, and fish fatteh, a Bar Saracen signature of fried pita crisps layered with Goulburn Valley rainbow trout, chickpeas, yoghurt and tahini. To complete, there will likely be summer time fruits, semolina cake and a Lebanese milk pudding referred to as mahalabia.
The menu was impressed by Sarafian’s final journey to Lebanon, the place he says tables loaded with chilly mezze, sizzling dishes and sweets are a standard morning ritual.
“It’s actually vibrant, contemporary and summery. I assumed it could be a cool alternative to do one thing like that on the Atrium,” he says.
Award-winning cocktail bar The Everleigh will pour on-theme drinks such because the Crosscourt Cooler, that includes Campari, manzanilla sherry, cucumber and a splash of soda, and Internet Twine negronis, freshened up with pink grapefruit.
Event-goers can e book certainly one of two brunch sittings every day of the match earlier than Atrium switches into sundowner mode.
The venue will likely be open to the general public from 8pm for extra Everleigh cocktails and Sarafian snacks, together with sambousek (halloumi-filled crescent pastries), gildas (anchovy, inexperienced chilli and olive skewers), rooster kebabs in pita and extra. These dishes can be found to order a la carte.
Elsewhere on the Australian Open, punters will discover Atlas Eating chef Charlie Carrington’s Cubano sandwich store Little Havana, modern Filipino restaurant Serai (not too long ago visited by Gordon Ramsay), Persian social enterprise SalamaTea and Andrew McConnell’s cafe Morning Market.
McConnell’s butchery model, Meatsmith, has partnered with the Open’s official champagne, Piper-Heidsieck, at its champagne bar on the Rod Laver Enviornment Terrace. Tennis-goers can snack on the likes of Western Australian-style Conti rolls, that includes deli meats on a Baker Bleu ciabatta roll, with a Piper-Heidsieck cuvee.
Tom Sarafian at Bar Atrium, January 14-28 from 10.30am every day. Brunch from $175 a head, plus the ticket price. Evenings a la carte, plus the ticket price. ausopen.com/dining-experiences#bar
Emma Breheny – Emma is Good Meals’s Melbourne-based reporter and co-editor of The Age Good Meals Information 2024.