Drawing from the Mahjong rooms of 1920s Shanghai, Moondrop Bar brings east-meets-west decadence to Fitzroy’s Gertrude Street.
If the idea of clandestine nooks and old-world Shanghai glamour makes your ears prick up, it’s worth making a beeline for Melbourne’s newest cocktail hangout: Moondrop Bar. The venue, which opened to the public on Sunday 4 January, is the brainchild of Steve Chan, Jesse Kourmouzis and Jacob Muoio – the trio behind Carlton North’s Sleepy’s Cafe & Wine Bar.
The site was once the home of Melbourne legacy institution The Everleigh, which closed its doors in March 2025 after 14 years of operation. Now, Moondrop Bar is making its own mark with a contemporary, east-meets-west take on warm Chinese hospitality. Expect craft cocktails and bespoke bar snacks in this ambient atmosphere.
The design
Moondrop Bar is fitted out with handpainted mosaics and moon-like lighting. (Image: Mike Lam)
Upon stepping foot inside, guests are drawn into a sultry world of red velvet drapery and subtle references to Chinese culture. Custom-made Mahjong tables hark back to roaring twenties Shanghai, while subtle rabbit motifs nod to the Chinese Zodiac. It’s a space that’s equal dashes moody and inviting, with a glowing orb light and sheets of white textiles hanging over the ruby-hued mosaic bar.
Along with a main bar with capacity for up to 76 people, the bar also offers a function room for events and celebrations.
Drinking
Cocktails are (Image: Mike Lam)
Whether you’re seeking to dip your tongue into new flavour combinations or discover delightful riffs on classics, Moondrop Bar’s cocktails shine bright. The drinks menu swings eastern, heroing lesser-known Chinese spirits and alluding to Shanghai’s east-meets-west era.
Signature libations include bubble milk tea-inspired Me & Ube, Hakuna Martini with yuzushu and honey water, and Chanhatten – Japanese whisky, Lapsang Souchong tea-infused vermouth, creme de cacao and bitters. For those who prefer fresh and fruity notes, opt for Crimson Ruby (watermelon, rhubarb aperitif, rose tea and prosecco) or Peaches (gin, elderflower liquer and white peach cordial).
A generous selection of low- and non-alcoholic beverages offers flavour combos as exciting as the stronger stuff, meaning everyone can experience the fun.
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Dining
Nibble on bespoke bar snacks. (Image: Mike Lam)
While drinks are the starring act at Moondrop Bar, the Chinese-Australian bar snacks are well worth a nibble, from barbecue mushroom bao buns and Cantarbrian anchovies with bread and butter to good ol’ prawn crackers. Also on offer is a seasonally rotating dumpling menu, along with charcuterie grazing plates, a cheese menu and bespoke caviar tins accompanied by scallion pikelets and chives. Sweet tooths ought not to miss Moondrop Bar’s signature mooncake, which is filled with vanilla and red bean ice cream.
The details
Tables nod to the Mahjong rooms of 1920s Shanghai. (Image: Mike Lam)
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Eleanor Edström is Australian Traveller’s Associate Editor. Previously a staff writer at Signature Luxury Travel & Style and Vacations & Travel magazines, she's a curious wordsmith with a penchant for conservation, adventure, the arts and design. She discovered her knack for storytelling much earlier, however – penning mermaid sagas in glitter ink at age seven. Proof that her spelling has since improved, she holds an honours degree in English and philosophy, and a French diploma from the University of Sydney. Off duty, you’ll find her pirouetting between Pilates and ballet classes, or testing her friends’ patience with increasingly obscure vocabulary.
Tuck your napkin firmly in place and get ready to dive into Bendigo’s history.
It’s an internationally recognised fact that Bendigo food experiences prove this region knows how to wine and dine. After all, its shiraz-laden landscape was named Australia’s first UNESCO Creative City and Region of Gastronomy. But what visitors lured in by this shiny label might not know is how deeply its culinary scene sits within the gold-rush town’s colourful past.
Whether you’re eating in a grand colonial bank or nibbling through a gold miner’s garden, grab a big plate. In Bendigo, every meal is served with a huge helping of heritage.
Take a food tour
Join a Foodie Walking Tour to local highlights like Ms Batterhams.
Start in the capable hands of Bendigo Guided Tours. Named as the 2025 Victorian Best New Tourism Business, they run two 12-person options. A Taste of Bendigo – Foodie Walking Tour will see you tasting seasonal dishes and sipping wine, craft beer and cocktails made with regional spirits over two-and-a-half hours, with stops at Ms Batterhams, Wine Bank on View, The Dispensary and Bendigo Brewing.
You can up the ante a notch or two with the Four Hats of Bendigo – a night of fine-dine hopping with the experts across Terrae, Le Foyer, Alium Dining and The Woodhouse.
Book a table
Dine at Terrae.
Alternatively, see Bendigo’s stars under your own steam. There’s Terrae, where produce from the owners’ own farm kitchen garden and orchard is plated up inside what was once a bank, while cocktails are poured in the underground bar below. For something special, book a private table in old bank vault. Rather less wholesome? The bullet hole in the window – a throwback to Victoria’s wild gold rush era.
Another former bank-turned-eatery, Alium Dining, goes full art nouveau inside a 1908 building overlooking the Alexandra Fountain in the heart of Bendigo. Here, Alium’s Asian-meets-European flavours run all the way from duck leg croquettes with mandarin marmalade to raw trevally with coconut and nước chấm, to pork milanese with anchovy and stout mustard.
Beneath an old school hall at Mackenzie Quarters, Ms Batterhams serves southern European-inspired dishes inside a 19th-century basement bar and restaurant. Beyond its sourdough crumpets (smeared with taramasalata, paprika and parsley oil, if you must know) is the origin of the restaurant’s name: Winifred Batterham, the owners’ mother’s former kindergarten teacher. Honour her properly with a ‘Winifred’ cocktail.
Alium Dining offers a unique setting inside a 1908 building.
Carnivores, get ready to bang your sharpest knives on the table. Bendigo’s only dedicated steakhouse, The Woodhouse, specialises in Wagyu sourced from surrounding farms. They’ve got beef every which way – from tartare topped with Giaveri Oscietra caviar and wagyu toast to porterhouse dry-aged and grilled over redgum.
Your next bank stop on the food circuit is Bunja Thai. Housed inside the former Colonial Bank, it’s all Victorian-era Australian grandeur, from the enormous arched ceilings to the detailing overhead. Thai Singha and local craft beer jostle for attention – but both are perfect quenchers when you’re sharing barramundi baked in banana leaf beneath all that old-world opulence.
If your trip through Australia isn’t complete without a country pub stop, make it The Bridgewater Hotel on the Loddon River. Renovated since its 1942 beginnings, but the establishment still retains its Art Deco charm. It’s the kind of place where steak burgers come stacked with bacon, egg, cheese and dripping beetroot relish, and are best handled in the riverside beer garden.
Pour a glass
Find over 180 local wines at Heathcote Wine Hub.
Your plate’s been stacked. Now it’s the glass’s turn – ideally with the famously bold shiraz and cab sav grown here. Early settlers in Bendigo and Heathcote were onto something when they first planted vines in the area’s mineral-rich soil, and their legacy still pours strong across more than 60 cellar doors today. Start big at the Heathcote Wine Hub, where more than 180 wines from nearby vineyards sit beneath the rafters of a restored former wooden church, with 16 available to taste by the glass.
Heathcote Winery might have become one of the area’s first commercial wineries in the seventies, but its story started way before its courtyard tastings. Back in 1854, it operated as a miners’ produce store during the gold-rush years. Other cellar doors aren’t immune to reinvention under the wine wave either. At Munari Wines in Heathcote, charcuterie boards are presented in their newly renovated cellar, originally the stables of the former sheep station.
Discover local events
Time your trip for the Heritage and Hidden Spaces Wine Walk
Time your trip right and watch the parks, gardens and buildings fill with food and drink. Fans of the malt: mark 29 August 2026 for Bendigo On The Hop, when craft breweries take over venues throughout the CBD. Brews make way for history at the Heritage and Hidden Spaces Wine Walk (17 October 2026), where bottles are opened inside some of the city’s most interesting buildings – including rarely opened spaces. In November, the Regional Gin Gala raises spirits in Mackenzie Quarters with a boozy celebration of its homegrown distilleries, including Noble Bootleggers, Envy Distilling and In Good Spirits. Explore wine, food and live music at Heathcote on Show (6 – 8 June 2026).
Take it all in
Tram meets tasty at Bendigo Tram Cafe.
Takeaway means something different in Bendigo. At Australia’s oldest operating Tram Depot, the Tram Cafe sits aboard an out-of-service 1916 N-Class Tram that serves tea and scones. Once you’ve polished off the last crumb, you can even pop into the driver’s cab and try the controls yourself.
Peppergreen Farm continues Bendigo’s long connection to Chinese market gardens, first established here by immigrants in the 1850s. Today, the not-for-profit farm invites visitors to pick up organic produce, alongside jars of honey harvested from its own hives.
Indulge in retail therapy
Elevate your at-home dining experience after a trip to Bendigo Pottery.
If there’s still room in your bag among the clanking jars and bottles, stop by Uniquely Bendigo inside the Old Post Office. Sharing space with the Bendigo Visitor Centre, it’s a one-stop shop for favourites like Bendigo Brittle, Bridgeward Grove and Tea Associates.
If you’d rather leave your fingerprints on your Bendigo souvenir, there’s a place for that too. At Bendigo Pottery, visitors can try their hand at shaping clay while taking part in another tradition of evolving old spaces – creating works of art within Australia’s oldest working pottery.
