Estelle Bistro - Melbourne

We had a wonderful lunch at Estelle Bistro on Sunday. At lunch on Sundays the bistro offers a set 3 course seasonal lunch for $60 per person or a $90 four course menu. We opted for the seasonal lunch, which also includes a glass of wine, beer or a mock tail. Such good value. We started with a mushroom volute with a soft poached egg. It was rich and delicious with crunchy croutons. We were also served warm sourdough with butter with this course. The main was melt in the mouth lamb shoulder with sprouts, parsnip and pumpkin purée. The meat was great and the vegetables delicious. Dessert was a lovely tart with mousse and a sorbet. I am not usually a dessert person, but this was excellent and was my favourite course of the lunch.Service was very friendly and efficient but not overbearing. Ambience was wonderful and even though tables were spaced for social distancing the atmosphere was warm and cosy. Estelle is still excellent, I hope to return many more times.

My first time to Estelle and I am super impressed. It’s been a very long time since I’d been to a restaurant that’s of such great food quality and service.<br/ <br/ My company organised a paid all staff company lunch function. We had a 3 course sit down lunch which we were able to select 1 item from each course option.<br/ <br/ <br/ LOCATION<br/ <br/ Estelle is situated on the main busy strip of High Street, about an 8 minute walk from Northcote train station. Parking can be a little difficult as its such a busy street, but there’s a lot of side street parking around the area.<br/ <br/ As you walk into Estelle there is an open space area with a number of high tables, I presume this is the bar area. It looks very stylish and modern décor. To the right through the doors is the main dining area with a large open space kitchen. The space is somewhat dark, but there is a lot of natural lighting through the windows.<br/ <br/ SERVICE<br/ <br/ The service by all the waiters was impeccable. Seeing that our company had booked out the whole restaurant, to be it looked like an organised chaos. All the staff knew exactly what they were doing and which tables they were looking after. There were at times drink orders were a little slow, but that’s understandable.<br/ <br/ MENU<br/ <br/ Entree<br/ Pea veloute, falafel, broad bean, yoghurt<br/ Fraser Island crab mornay, curry oil<br/ Kingfish crudo, sesame, avocado<br/ Quail, pear, mulberry, macademia<br/ <br/ Main<br/ Hand rolled macroni, cultivated mushrooms pecorino<br/ Grilled Humpty Doo barramundi, prawns, zucchini flower<br/ Mayura Station wagyu rump, wild garlic, nori<br/ <br/ <br/ Dessert<br/ Seasonal berries, white chocolate, basil<br/ Mango, coconut pavlova<br/ Rhubarb cheesecake<br/ Artisan cheese selection<br/ <br/ VERDICT<br/ <br/ I cannot comment on price as it was a paid lunch event by my company. However the menu the restaurant provided us was fabulous. There was great variety of options which made it a little hard for selection. For entrée I had the Kingfish crudo, sesame and avocado. Oh my goodness, I absolutely cannot fault this dish. It was soo tasty, yet light in flavour. I could have easily had another serve of it. For the main, I had the barramundi. The fish was cooked perfectly, with great flavours of<br/ <br/ There were sides of Caesar salad and roasted carrots which were both very tasty. I had a lot of the carrots as it was lightly glazed in honey – yum!<br/ <br/ The dessert was the Rhubarb cheesecake. I was a little surprised to see it come out as deconstructed. I was expecting it to be a normal cheesecake slice. Regardless, the cake was delicious. Everything that I had I couldn’t fault. Speaking with other colleagues on the table that ordered other types of food, they all thoroughly enjoyed their meals as well.

Pleasant restaurant layout and atmosphere and the wait staff were excellent. The food is inventive and delicious!

Had a nice long lunch at Estelle and food quality was great but overall, all servings were tiny including mains and none of the dishes blew my mind. They were all nice but so tiny servings more like bite size so too expensive for what it is.

We visited Estelle as part of their annual truffle dinners which was brilliant value at $100 for 5 courses or $160 with matched wines.<br/ <br/ Our night included:<br/ Comte soldiers and truffle gougeres (choux pastries)<br/ Abalone, roast chicken black truffle consommé<br/ Pine mushroom truffle tortellini<br/ Mayura Station wagyu, soft baked celeriac black truffle jus<br/ Jerusalem artichoke, black truffle chocolate<br/ <br/ I found the first two dishes nice but not very memorable, luckily the tortellini and wagyu were both fantastic and I couldn’t choose a favourite between them. Also loved the dessert with Jerusalem artichoke ice cream and a super smooth chocolate base (somewhere between a mousse and ganache). <br/ <br/ Loved the gorgeous modern monochrome interior and would love to sit at the bar next time (if eating as a couple) to see the chefs in action. Would return for their amazing pasta alone!