7 Best Places to Eat in Melbourne
Melbourne’s food scene runs on multicultural neighborhoods and markets rather than one central strip, and the city’s coffee culture is a genuine point of civic pride, not just marketing.
Queen Victoria Market
The 1878 market is still the place to start, with produce stalls, a deli hall and the seasonal Night Markets adding food trucks and live music after dark.
South Melbourne Market
A quieter alternative to Queen Vic, with a similar mix of produce, seafood and prepared food stalls and its own set of regulars.
Chinatown yum cha
Little Bourke Street’s Chinatown, the oldest continuously operating Chinatown in the Western world, is built for a long yum cha lunch.
Lygon Street, Carlton
Carlton’s Lygon Street is credited as the birthplace of Australia’s espresso culture, and Pellegrini’s, open since 1954, is the historic espresso bar to know. The street itself is Melbourne’s “Little Italy,” lined with Italian restaurants and delis.
Victoria Street, Richmond
Known locally as “Little Saigon,” Richmond’s Victoria Street is the place for Vietnamese food, from pho to banh mi.
Lonsdale Street’s Greek precinct
Melbourne has the largest Greek population of any city outside Greece, and the Lonsdale Street precinct in the CBD is where that shows up on the menu.
A pub parma and a dim sim
The chicken parmigiana, or “parma,” is a fixture of Melbourne pub menus and a reliable, filling order almost anywhere. If you spot a dim sim at a market stall, try it too: a Melbourne-invented fried or steamed snack from around 1945 that isn’t the same thing as Cantonese dim sum.
A note on coffee: Melburnians will tell you the flat white is their invention, but it’s more accurately described as an “Australasian” one, contested between Australia and New Zealand rather than settled in Melbourne’s favor.
Tipping isn’t expected in Melbourne the way it is in the US; rounding up for good service is common, but nothing more is required. For where to base yourself near all this, see our places to stay guide , or the full Melbourne guide for the rest of the city.