A beautifully dilapidated exhibition that will transport you back in time. Where you should be eating and drinking this summer. And free Portuguese-tart-inspired soft serves. Here’s what Broadsheet Melbourne editor Tomas Telegramma is checking out in Melbourne in December.

The best of the best openings
It’s that time of year again – when all the investigative eating and drinking the Broadsheet team has done over the past 12 months culminates in three carefully curated guides to the absolute best new openings. Consider them your summer hit lists. In the restaurant arena, 2022 has been all about evolution, and the ability to carve out a niche among the noise was what made these 11 new openings such show-stoppers. (I can’t stop thinking about an unadulterated six-seat Korean diner in the chef’s mountain-top home.) On the cafe front, we welcomed a mighty motley crew of newcomers – and extended our list’s brief to include “fast-casual” eateries. And bars-wise, the cream of the crop brought house-party vibes, Italo-American nostalgia and stellar new rooftop options.

The summer of art
Keeping up with Melbourne’s many, many art openings can be a challenge in the frenzy of the year. But if you’ve got some downtime over summer (hopefully), there’s a tonne of new exhibitions worth having on your radar, which we’ve packaged up in this terrifically textured list. Rone’s spectacle of beauty and decay in the dilapidated upper level of Flinders Street Station must be seen – in person – to be believed. The NGV’s latest fashion extravaganza is a blow-by-blow of the trailblazing career of the late, great Alexander McQueen. And Heide is playing host to the first Australian solo exhibition of renowned modernist sculptor Barbara Hepworth (check out the new cafe and museum shop while you’re there – Heide’s had a glow-up).

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Local Knowledge returns
Broadsheet’s Local Knowledge series is a deep dive into the eateries around which Melbourne’s countless different cultural communities orbit. And for our latest instalment, it’s all about Malta as we visit a small-but-mighty pastizzi shop in the ’burbs, which uses a recipe that goes back five generations. As many as 3600 diamond-shaped pastizzi (crispy, flaky Maltese filled pastries) are made daily at The Original Maltese Pastizzi Co, a bright-red shopfront in Sunshine North. Flavours range from the true-to-tradition ricotta or curried pea, to the less conventional. But it’s more than just a purveyor of fine pastizzi – it’s also an important meeting spot for the city’s Maltese diaspora. “We see reunions inside the shop,” says co-owner Melissa Wassilieff , “and customers who look at an imported item which takes them back to their childhood, and they cry because it brings back so many memories.”

Your Christmas companion
Somehow, Christmas is imminent. And we want to help you do it better this year. First up, if you’re fresh out of present inspo, consult our gift guide and its last-minute companion. If it’s ham advice you’re after, we’ve recruited Attica’s Ben Shewry to tell you how to bake an outstanding one, and we’ve got a guide to the best Melbourne hams to buy (the order cut-off date has passed for some, but not for all). More generally, for tips on nailing Christmas lunch (or dinner, or something in between), have a read of these suggestions from top Aussie chefs. And if all else fails, outsource. This round-up is for those of you who’d prefer to have the day off cooking duty this Christmas. Will you order in or dine out?

It’s gelato season
Balmy weather is on the horizon. Finally. Which, for me at least, means more time to mosey around in search of a mid-afternoon or after-dinner scoop of gelato. And luckily, some attention-grabbing newcomers have opened just in time for summer. The first is the long-awaited Pidapipo Laboratorio, where – instead of the classics – you’ll find experimental, exclusive and excellent new flavours. Elsewhere, we’ve scored three new Asian-inspired gelato and ice-cream shops doing vibrant flavours, mochi-wrapped variations and even slushie spiders. And if you want to go where the experts go, here’s our guide to where Melbourne chefs get their scoops. Plus, special alert: Casa Nata is doing a Portuguese-tart-inspired soft serve (and giving out freebies all day on Saturday December 17).