During winter, whilst most Melbournians are hidden away indoors in the warmth, in their ugg boots on the couch with a mug of hot chocolate, those of us willing to brave the elements are in for a treat. For the fourth year running, every Wednesday night until August 26, the Queen Victoria Market comes alive for the Winter Night Markets. While night markets in Australia are usually synonymous with summer, sangria and live music, The Queen Vic winter night markets borrow a bit of inspiration from the European Christmas night markets and then put a quintessentially Melbourne slant on them.

The weather may be cold and inclement outdoors, but once you are under the canopy of the market, a beautiful warmth embraces you. There are open pit fires lit up across the market, and everywhere people are huddled around them eating their delicious treats. The fires are cordoned off so there is no fear of falling in!

There are lots of little stalls set up with everything from tarot cards and fortune telling, ecologically friendly soaps, knitted scarves and beanies, all the way to some typically Melbourne artwork. There was also a very cool roaming silent disco which involved a big pack of people dancing around the market with headphones on! I was very tempted to join them!

My eyes were firmly on the prize though, and I quickly made my way to all the food stalls to decide what I should eat.

Food is an integral part of the markets and there is plenty of variety on offer. There is everything from soup, to skewers, to a pop up 400 Gradi stand making pizzas! I made sure to remember that my stomach had a limited capacity and carefully made my choices for the night.

The first thing we tried was a hot apple cider. This had been recommended to me earlier in the week, so I knew that I had to tick this off my list. Think of apple pie in liquid form, and you will have the flavour of this hot apple cider. It was delicious with strong overtones of those typically winter spices in cinnamon and cloves. The drink was served with a little cinnamon donut as a garnish and together they proved to be the perfect start to the night.

We then moved on to the entrees. Our initial plan was to have skewers, a vegetable skewer for me and a chicken skewer for the other half, but unfortunately (or maybe fortunately?!) the Poppy's Thai stall had run out of vegetable skewers. The other half had a chicken skewer, which he said was delicious, and instead I lined up and got myself some cassava chips from the Mr. Cassava van. The last time I had cassava chips was in the Amazon jungle in an eco lodge, so I held them in pretty high regard, but luckily Mr. Cassava came through with the goods. These chips were just as good as I remembered them to be, a marginally denser texture than normal potato chips and with a slight earthy taste. Unfortunately, I was too eager to eat them, and forgot to take a photo of them, so you’re just going to have to trust me when I say that the serve was very generous for a snack portion.

Next we moved to mains. Again, via another recommendation, I had heard rave reviews about The Little Mushroom Co so I decided a burger from here was necessary. With a choice of quite a few burgers, I settled on the Ultra Mexican Mushroom Burger. I’m not sure how much of the burger was Mexican, let alone ultra Mexican, but it was definitely ultra tasty. There was a big portabello mushroom, a generous slice of haloumi, some spicy chipotle mayo, balsamic, and parmesan all served in a ciabatta bun. It was a great burger and made me realise that I could easily replicate this at home! My only criticism was that it was a touch on the small side but other than that there were no complaints.

I probably could have eaten more, and there were a fair few other stalls that caught my eye, but I forced myself to exercise restraint and didn’t eat any more. At least it gives me an excuse to go back another night!

Now in their second year, the Melbourne Night Noodle Markets have become an important fixture of the Good Food Month calendar in Melbourne. This year the organisers were better equipped to deal with the crowds and moved the markets to Birrarung Marr across three separate areas. It was a beautiful atmosphere, with open grassy spaces, the backdrop of the Melbourne skyline with the MCG, the Arts Centre spire and the Eureka tower in the background, and most importantly some of the best Asian food traders we have, there to showcase their food.

We started our foodie adventures with some dumplings at New Shanghai. This is the new dumpling place that has opened at the Emporium. I got the vegetarian dumplings, of which there were three in a serve. The dumplings were quite flavoursome but rather small, but still a good start to the evening.

Next up was Le Bangkok where we tried the tofu pad thai. Pad thai is one of our favourite noodle dishes, and this was a good one. There was a good amount of tofu which was contrasted by the freshness of the bean shoots and spring onion. I would definitely consider going back to the Le Bangkok restaurant to get some more.

I decided it was important to try a variety of cuisines, so after hitting up the Chinese and Thai stalls, I decided to move on to Sri Lankan. Lankan Tucker was there, and watching them use their skills to make kothu roti was enough to make me salivate. Unfortunately they only had chicken kothu roti, so I had to settle for a pan roll, but this was pretty damn good. Infact it was so good that it went down before I could get a photo.

We then moved on to our second area up on the hill of Birrarung Marr. This was definitely the premium area with both Kong and Chin Chin setting up shop here. Both had long lines, but I was adamant that we had to try at least one. Given that I still haven’t been to Kong, we decided to try their famous buns. Let me tell you, they were definitely worth the wait. I had the peanut butter salt and pepper tofu bun, with pickled mustard crushed peanuts, chilli mayonnaise and some fresh coriander to cut through it all. It was amazing and I could have eaten ten of them, but I forced myself to exercise some self control and stopped at just one.

And needless to say it would have been sacrilegious for me to walk past an Indian stall and not indulge in any Indian street food, so I made a stop at Overdosa. This was an all vego stall so I had a full menu to choose from, and I opted for the Bombay Burger. This was an aloo bonda (or spiced potato patty) in a vada pav roll (sweet milk bun), which was liberally slathered with tomato sauce and garnished with fresh green chilli. Definitely took me back to my Indian street food roots...

 

 

And of course we had to finish with dessert. Whilst the majority of the crowds flocked to the Gelato Messina stall, we opted for crème brulee at the Brulee Cart. We had a Dulce de Loco crème brulee which was a cardamom spiced custard sitting on a bed of poached pears and topped with some salted caramel popcorn. Unfortunately our crème brulee standards are pretty high, and whilst the flavours worked well together, the custard seemed a little runnier than we would have liked it. Still we polished it off quite easily, so I definitely wouldn’t call it all bad.

All in all it was a great evening. Perhaps some tips for people going next year:

Go on a weekday, go early in the season, and get there by 6pm at the latest. The people who went at about 7pm on the last Friday almost gave up waiting in hour long queues.

Take cash. There are only a handful of Citibank ATMs and they have massive queues.

See if you can get yourself into a marquee to secure a seat. This year both the Citibank and The Age marquees were available. The Citibank marquee required you to show your card, and The Age marquee required pre registration for subscribers.

And most importantly, go with an empty stomach. There is so much food, and it would be a sin not to make the most of it!

Last Saturday I had the privilege of joining a group of other bloggers for a tour of the South Melbourne Market. The South Melbourne market is the oldest market in Melbourne, and one of my favourites for fresh produce, but I had little idea of all the other amazing shops there. 

We met up outside the LG Kitchen which is host to some great cooking classes with top chefs, where we were greeted by Janet our guide for the morning. Janet gave us a brief overview of the market and its history, and then off we went to explore!

The owner of The Brow Bar with Janet

Our first stop was The Brow Bar. This stall is a relative newcomer to the market, and focuses on the Middle Eastern and Subcontinental technique of threading for hair removal. We were also surprised to learn that a large percentage of the clientèle here are male!

Henrietta from Sleep Couture

We then headed to SO:ME Space, which is an area created to showcase small designers and their pop up stalls. On the day we were there, there was Henrietta who specialises in some gorgeous sleepwear. You can see her uber cool leopard skin ugg boots in the background!

John from Pardon My French

We kept moving along to our next stop which was a crepe stall called Pardon My French. John, the crepe master was flat out trying to keep up with demand, and apparently his speciality is the Nutella crepe! I definitely need to come back and try it!

Our next stop was a shop called A Story By Another Name. We learnt that this shop has been a fixture of the market for 50 years, run by the same family over 3 generations! They stock Bonds apparel, mainly hoodies and t-shirts, and Converse shoes. Their point of difference is however, that they only stock items in black, grey white, navy, and the odd bit of khaki, and allow the wearer to create their own look with the base colours. A novel concept which has obviously worked!

These are Rollie shoes, which are stocked at Creatures Of Comfort. How bloody cute are they?!

The next shop we stopped at was Klopper. This was a gorgeous store with the most amazing ceiling piece, but for me, the highlight was the Kester Black nail polish that they stock. Kester Black is a brand started by a Melbourne based lady who creates cruelty free nail polishes! I will definitely be back here to get some!

And then we came to my absolute favourite shop, The Soap Shop. This was definitely one of the highlights of the day for me. As you can see, and as the name tells you, The Soap Shop obviously stocks soap, and all of it is natural, organic, and fantastic for people who have sensitive skin. But for me, the best part was the huge range of liquid soaps and cleaning products available. They have everything from body wash and shampoo, to laundry detergent, dish washing liquid and even dog shampoo! They run an environmentally friendly program where you bring in your own bottle and they fill it up for you. Such a brilliant concept, and one I will definitely take advantage of now that I know about it!

Being a vegetarian, nut shops are high on my priority list, and Rita's Coffee and Nut Shop was fabulous! I think what made it so special was Rita herself! She was a great character, full of laughs, and so passionate about her store and the products. We were invited to taste so delicious walnuts, and also sample some of her many mixes, including the now infamous virility mix!

Cheese is an absolute staple in my diet, in fact one of the first things I have bought for my new kitchen is a cheese board! At Vangeli's Deli were were treated to samples of some delicious brie and cheddar.

Elle of Cherry and Me with a rather unique bodysuit!

Frankie's story is a subsidiary of the previously mentioned A Story By Another Name, which focuses on Kids wear. The little Converse shoes were a particular hit with us, and we only wished they made larger sizes of the giraffe chucks!

One of the last stores we visited was Georgie's Harvest Potatoes and Herbs. I never realised there were so many different varieties of potatoes! Georgie takes great pride in the produce she sells, all of which is sourced from niche growers.

The interior of the store smells gorgeous, mainly due to the dried eucalyptus that is hanging from the roof. Below that is many cords of garlic and chilli, all hung to dry.

One of the highlights from Georgie was the shitaki mushroom tree that they have in the store! It was amazing and I have never seen anything like it before!

Overall, it was a fantastic day! I've always loved markets, and this was no exception! It was also lovely to meet some other bloggers, and for once we didn't feel ridiculous walking around with our DSLRs, iPhone cameras, and taking a ridiculous number of pictures! I'm sure people thought we were tourists!

A huge thankyou to Nuffnang and the South Melbourne Market for hosting us! I will definitely be back!