• Add Melbourne’s best cafe (and bakery) openings of 2020 to your hit list.

• Get banh xeo – a crisp, stuffed Vietnamese pancake – in taco form at Hanoi Hannah’s Elsternwick outpost. (The pork and prawn with lemongrass-sate sauce is our pick.)

• Rooftop views; rotisserie-chicken rolls and flame-licked steaks (by an ex-Supernormal head chef); and Margaritas on tap: introducing the Hobsons Bay Hotel.

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• Bar Saracen’s Tom Sarafian is doing next-level Sunday sessions – with guest chefs and DJs – at Brunswick’s Rumi. This week it’s a Lebanese-Mexican mash-up with Meatsmith’s Chris Watson.

• Summer is here. Crack into one of Vino Quarantino’s new two-litre flagons of rosé or fiano.

• The fresh-faced Ponyfish Island is a slice of Palm Springs smack bang in the middle of the Yarra (with Ponystar Martinis).

• A new oyster bar has arrived at South Melbourne Market, with prawn katsu sandos, lobster rolls, poke bowls … and a multitude of molluscs.

• Smash Wagyu-butter pretzels, ox-tongue Reubens and beer magnums at this West Footscray pop-up by Hop Nation and Navi’s Julian Hills.

• Finally: an opening date for Chin Chin’s Chris Lucas’s ambitious new restaurant.

• Pull up at Queen Victoria Market’s Festive Food Truck Stop for mac’n’cheese croquettes, fluffy bao buns and fried Jamaican jerk chicken.

• Here’s why you can get lobster on your Christmas table for a fraction of the cost.

• DOC is known for its glutinous, cheesy, salami-topped pizzas. But its latest restaurant is entirely vegetarian and gluten-free (and very vegan-friendly).

• Five storeys. Five years in the making. The Arbory team is opening a mega-venue in a heritage-listed Melbourne building.

• There’ll be gelato, chocolate, pizza and rooftop beekeeping at Pipapipo’s new Melbourne headquarters.

• Lucky Coq is becoming Clucky Coq with its freshly hatched, 11-item menu of panko-crumbed parmas.

• A Southeast Asian spin on spaghetti aglio e oglio (garlic and oil), red-curry prawn toast, pandan soft serve and more at Sunda’s cuisine-crossing pop-up is here.

• Celebrity chef Karen Martini is bringing an all-day restaurant and wine bar to the CBD.

• Port Melbourne has a lofty new dining destination, where it’s all about seafood (and whisky-glazed Basque burnt cheesecake).

• ‘Tis the season to stuff your face. Here are some topnotch festive foods (and a spiced apple-pie gin) to order for Christmas.

• Off-menu alert: Melbourne’s newest American barbeque joint is doing a secret, saucy beef-brisket dish.