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The Sitchu Awards 2025 Winners: Victoria
The results are in and the winners of the very first Sitchu Awards have been crowned.
After thousands of nominations and votes from readers across Victoria, the inaugural Sitchu Awards winners have been revealed. Across nine categories, readers crowned 98 Lygon Street Bar & Bistro the only double winner, taking out Best Date Night Spot and Best New Restaurant Opening, alongside Hector’s Deli for Best Deli or Sandwich Spot, Baker Bleu for Best Bakery, Albert’s Wine Bar for Best Neighbourhood Bar, the Mornington Peninsula for Best Weekend Escape, ST. ALi for Best Coffee Spot, Thinkers & Makers for Best Small Local Business and Brunswick for Best Foodie Suburb.
From a Brunswick East bistro made for long dinners to the Mornington Peninsula’s vineyards, beaches and hot springs, these are the Victorian venues, regions, neighbourhoods and local businesses readers chose as the very best of 2025.
Sitchu Awards 2025 Winning Categories
- What Are the Sitchu Awards?
- Best Date Night Spot in Melbourne 2025
- Best Bakery in Melbourne 2025
- Best Deli or Sandwich Spot in Melbourne 2025
- Best Neighbourhood Bar in Melbourne 2025
- Best Region For a Weekend Escape in Victoria 2025
- Best New Restaurant Opening in Melbourne 2025
- Best Coffee Spot in Melbourne 2025
- Best Small Local Business in Melbourne 2025
- Best Foodie Suburb in Melbourne 2025
- FAQs About the Sitchu Awards Victoria 2025
What Are the Sitchu Awards?
The inaugural Sitchu Awards celebrate the places shaping the way we live, dine and play across Victoria, from the bakery that starts your morning just right to the neighbourhood bar that feels like a second living room.
Here’s how it worked: nominations opened to Sitchu readers across VIC, giving the community the chance to put forward the spots that genuinely matter to them. Sitchu’s editors then curated five finalists across each of the nine categories before voting reopened, with thousands of reader votes determining the winners.
The results are entirely reader-driven, with no editorial panel and no paid placements.
Best Date Night Spot in Melbourne 2025
The restaurants, wine bars and neighbourhood rooms that set the stage for an excellent evening.
Winner: 98 Lygon Street Bar & Bistro
98 Lygon Street has that rare neighbourhood-bistro magic: smart enough for date night, relaxed enough for a Tuesday steak frites detour. Inside, it’s all European brasserie warmth, generous service and a menu that slips from sharp snacks to crème brûlée with ease. Brunswick East locals have found their corner table, and honestly, they’re not giving it up anytime soon now.
Brunswick East
Runner up: Vinesmith
Vinesmith makes the CBD feel dangerously civilised: a city cellar door, wine bar, bottle shop and French-leaning bistro wrapped into one Flinders Lane address. The drawcard is serious wine without the stiff collar, with Blue Pyrenees and Glenlofty pours, clever imports and dishes built for staying put. Order well, stay late, call it research for your next very important glass.
Melbourne CBD
Best Deli or Sandwich Spot in Melbourne 2025
Where the sandwiches are stacked high, the flavours bold, and tomorrow’s cravings are guaranteed.
Winner: Hector’s Deli
Hector’s Deli didn’t just ride Melbourne’s sandwich boom, it helped start it. The order is either the fried chicken, hot, crisp and barely contained, or the HCT with mortadella, provolone, mozzarella and tomato chutney. Add a tuna melt if you’re sharing, plus a doughnut if the cabinet hasn’t been fleeced. Big lines, bigger sandwiches; we truly believe in its deserved hype.
Multiple locations in Melbourne
Runner up: Hugo’s Deli
Hugo’s Deli gives Richmond serious sandwich competition, with shokupan fried chicken, Reubens, tuna melts and specials that keep regulars hovering. The move is the fried chicken: golden, soft-shelled, saucy and stacked with shredded lettuce and pickles. Reuben people are also well looked after, but the joy here is that every visit can become a different sandwich argument.
Richmond
Best Bakery in Melbourne 2025
Those irresistible loaves, pastries, or cakes you’ll happily queue for.
Winner: Baker Bleu
Baker Bleu has become Melbourne’s bread benchmark for good reason: dark-crusted sourdough with chew, character and the patience of a 48-hour ferment. The order is beautifully simple: a loaf for later, a sourdough croissant for now, and, at Cremorne, the Reuben toastie or challah French toast with Market Lane coffee for the walk out.
Multiple locations in Melbourne
Runner up: Zelda Bakery
Zelda Bakery is Ripponlea’s tiny proof that devotion beats scale. Maaryasha Werdiger’s kosher bakery opens only on select mornings, which explains the line and the feverish pastry planning. The croissant has serious bragging rights, but don’t stop there: chase the sourdough, rugelach, babka, cookies and honestly, whatever cake is still standing by the time you reach the counter.
Ripponlea
Best Neighbourhood Bar in Melbourne 2025
A glass of local vino, a crafted cocktail, or the easy hum of your favourite haunt.
Winner: Albert’s Wine Bar
Albert’s sits behind Kings Arcade like Armadale’s best-kept side door: a 19th-century building with green marble tables, footpath seats and enough old bones to keep the room from getting too pleased with itself. The wine list moves often, travelling through small producers, New World bottles, French and Italian classics, and whatever the staff are excited to pour. Food is built for staying: oysters, cured meats, cheese, crab and sesame toast if it’s on, larger bistro plates and the salty, buttery things a wine bar demands.
Armadale
Runner up: Gemini
Gemini feels like the bar Coburg had been saving a corner for. Locals Tresna Lee and Shane Farrell took a 135-year-old Sydney Road building, kept its bluestone bones and filled it with coffee, pastries, wine, a pantry, a bottle shop and a chef’s table under an arch. The menu has neighbourhood magnetism: oysters, focaccia, ricotta, prawns on toast, the ever-changing bar sandwich.
Coburg
Best Region For a Weekend Escape in Victoria 2025
A close-to-home getaway with standout eats, scenic allure, and undeniable local character.
Winner: The Mornington Peninsula
The Mornington Peninsula wins weekends because it lets you change pace without losing pleasure. Start with coffee by the bay, disappear into cellar doors, book a long lunch at Pt Leo Estate or Laura, then finish salty-haired after a beach walk or thermal soak. Between wineries, farm gates, coastal villages and stays worth leaving work early for, it always overdelivers.
Mornington Peninsula, VIC
Runner up: Daylesford & Macedon Ranges
Daylesford and the Macedon Ranges understand the art of leaving town. There are mineral springs, handsome gardens, cellar doors, country pubs, bookshops, bakeries and long lunches that make dinner seem optimistic. Lake House still carries the grand old hush of a regional classic, Cliffy’s has the shelves and picnic provisions, and Bar Merenda brings local produce, serious bottles and a bistro upstairs that turns one glass into a small life choice. Add Trentham, Kyneton and Macedon, and one night away starts to look absurd. Perhaps you simply move there instead?
Daylesford & Macedon Ranges, VIC
Best New Restaurant Opening in Melbourne 2025
The newcomer already winning hearts and setting the bar high.
Winner: 98 Lygon Street Bar & Bistro
98 Lygon Street Bar & Bistro has the rare new-restaurant feeling of having always belonged. Co-founders Ben Clark and Simon Aukett brought serious hospitality muscle to Brunswick East, while chef Brian MacAlister built a menu that knows exactly when to flirt with France and when to feed you right: gougères, chicken liver parfait, beef cheek croquettes, steak frites and crème brûlée. The steak night is already folklore material.
Brunswick East
Runner up: Vinesmith
Vinesmith brings cellar-door muscle to Flinders Lane, then backs it up with food that knows exactly what wine wants. Blue Pyrenees, Glenlofty and sharp French imports anchor the list, while chef Richard Hayes sends out oysters, charcuterie, onglet with sauce au poivre and French-accented plates built around Australian produce. It works for a glass, but the smarter move is lunch that slowly loses track of time.
Melbourne CBD
Best Coffee Spot in Melbourne 2025
From perfectly pulled espresso shots to artisan brews, the cafés that get it right every single time.
Winner: ST. ALi
Melbourne coffee would feel different without ST. ALi. Born in a South Melbourne warehouse in 2005, it helped turn specialty coffee from inner-city obsession into everyday language, then kept moving: cafes, wholesale beans, cold brew, airport runs, pantry staples and collaborations that keep the brand in the bloodstream. It is big now, yes, but still tastes like Melbourne taking its morning very seriously.
Multiple locations across the city
Runner up: Good Measure
Good Measure understands that Melbourne coffee is never only coffee, and that one drink can become a movement. On Lygon Street, the Carlton cafe-bar moves from Code Black espresso and sarnies by day to vinyl, cocktails, Guinness and late-night snacks after dark. Its calling card is the Mont Blanc: iced filter coffee and dark sugar capped with cream, orange zest and nutmeg. Plenty have tried to copy it, but the original still has the better room, the longer hours and the line out front.
Carlton
Best Small Local Business in Melbourne 2025
Lifestyle, Beauty, Fashion, Wellness — the boutique and independent spots that bring personality, purpose and real community presence.
Winner: Thinkers & Makers
Thinkers & Makers understands that small retail is really emotional labour in better lighting. Maggie May and Joshua Moshe’s Caulfield North store has been doing it since 2017, gathering local art, books, cards, baby pieces, self-care, kitchen things and the little objects people buy when words fail. Free wrapping helps, but the charm is sharper: gifting with a heart, a memory and a human behind the counter.
Caulfield North
Runner up: Gertrude St Market
Gertrude St Market feels stitched into Fitzroy rather than air-dropped onto it. At 13 Gertrude Street, the Lee Mathews orbit opens out into fashion, art, objects, homewares and the useful pleasure of looking closely. Its strength is the street around it: galleries, boutiques, old pubs, good coffee, better outfits. Shopping here feels like a Saturday with real Melbourne texture.
Fitzroy
Best Foodie Suburb in Melbourne 2025
The neighbourhoods that pack a serious punch, serving up big flavours from hidden cafés to local culinary gems.
Winner: Brunswick
Brunswick takes the win because it does what Melbourne diners love most: feeds every mood without making a performance of it. Sydney Road still carries the suburb’s immigrant backbone, from Lebanese bakeries and falafel shops to Vietnamese noodles, Ethiopian share plates and old pub meals after dark. Then Brunswick East sharpens the edges with wine bars, modern Italian diners and serious neighbourhood restaurants. Cheap, generous, creative, a little scruffy: and exactly the point.
Runner up: Melbourne CBD
Melbourne CBD earns runner-up because no other suburb works harder for dinner. One block might mean a Flinders Lane reservation at Gimlet, Tipo 00 or Supernormal, the next dumplings in Chinatown, souvlaki near Lonsdale Street, ramen off a laneway or a steak after theatre. Its strength is scale: fine dining, snack runs, business lunches, student feeds and midnight cravings all colliding within a few tram stops.
FAQs About the Sitchu Awards Victoria 2025
The nine category winners for Victoria in 2025 were: 98 Lygon Street Bar & Bistro (Best Date Night Venue and Best New Restaurant Opening), Hector’s Deli (Best Deli or Sandwich Spot), Baker Bleu (Best Bakery), Albert’s Wine Bar (Best Neighbourhood Bar), The Mornington Peninsula (Best Region for a Weekend Escape), ST. ALi (Best Coffee Spot), Thinkers & Makers (Best Small Local Business), and Brunswick (Best Foodie Suburb). 98 Lygon Street Bar & Bistro was the standout double winner of the inaugural awards.
The Mornington Peninsula was voted the best region for a weekend escape in Victoria by Sitchu readers in 2025. Cellar doors, farm gates, coastal villages and thermal soaks make it easy to fill two days without much planning — a long lunch at Pt Leo Estate or Laura, a beach walk and a bay-side coffee will do it. Daylesford and the Macedon Ranges took runner-up, with mineral springs, country pubs, serious wine at Bar Merenda and provisions from Cliffy’s making a strong case for staying an extra night.
Brunswick was voted the best foodie suburb in Melbourne by Sitchu readers in 2025. Sydney Road’s Lebanese bakeries, Vietnamese noodles and Ethiopian share plates sit alongside Brunswick East’s wine bars, modern Italian diners and serious neighbourhood restaurants — cheap, generous and creative in equal measure. Melbourne CBD was named runner-up, recognised for its sheer range across Flinders Lane, Chinatown and beyond.
Baker Bleu was voted Melbourne’s best bakery by Sitchu readers in 2025. The drawcard is dark-crusted sourdough built on a 48-hour ferment, best paired with a sourdough croissant to eat on the way out — or the Reuben toastie and challah French toast at Cremorne for a slower morning. Zelda Bakery in Ripponlea, a kosher bakery open only on select mornings and known for its croissant, rugelach and babka, was named runner-up.
98 Lygon Street Bar & Bistro in Brunswick East took out Best New Restaurant Opening in Melbourne for 2025. Co-founders Ben Clark and Simon Aukett brought serious hospitality experience to the neighbourhood, with chef Brian MacAlister’s menu of gougères, chicken liver parfait, beef cheek croquettes, steak frites and crème brûlée already earning the steak night something close to folklore status. It also won Best Date Night Venue, making it the only double winner of the inaugural Sitchu Awards Victoria.
ST. ALi was voted Melbourne’s Best Coffee Spot by Sitchu readers in 2025, with multiple locations across the city. Born in a South Melbourne warehouse in 2005, it helped shape specialty coffee culture in Australia and is still going strong. Good Measure in Carlton was named runner-up, known for its Code Black espresso by day and its signature Mont Blanc — iced filter coffee topped with cream, orange zest and nutmeg — that no one has quite managed to replicate.
The Sitchu Awards 2025 were entirely reader-driven. Sitchu’s community was first invited to nominate their favourite venues and businesses across nine categories. After nominations closed, Sitchu’s editors curated five finalists per category before voting reopened, with thousands of reader votes from across Victoria determining the final winners. There was no editorial panel and no paid placements — every winner reflects what Victorian locals genuinely love.
Now that you’ve caught up on Sitchu’s 2025 award winners, check out the best new restaurants in Melbourne and the best new cafes and bakeries in Melbourne.
