With its European city planning and nocturnally skewed dining scene, it’s little wonder that Melbourne has some of the best steak restaurants on the whole eastern seaboard of Australia.
From award-winning examples with deep deep wine lists, to specialty venues offering up prime cuts cooked with a variety of national influences, these are the city’s best restaurants for carnivores in 2024.
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Gimlet
Pulling people to the corner of Russell Street and Flinders Lane is Andrew McConnell’s high-flying effort, Gimlet at Cavendish House.
One of the more recent additions to the Melbourne CBD dining scene in recent years, we wouldn’t be surprised if this becomes an institution in years to come. Aside from the elegantly dressed dining room and fleet-of-foot service, Gimlet’s food and cocktail service have been drawing rave reviews across the board.
Appropriately for any list of Melbourne’s best steak restaurants, the key to this popularity is a range of delicious and thoughtfully selected beef cuts: ranging from a local Gippsland beef tenderloin to the signature, monster-sized O’Connor T-Bone — cooked over coal and served with all your typically steak-y accoutrement.
Address:Â 91 Cardigan Street, Carlton VIC 3053
Chef(s):Â Colin Mainds
Opened:Â June, 2020
Price Guide:Â $$$$
Opening Hours: Monday – Sunday (12 PM – 12 AM)
Bookings: Recommended
Victor Churchill
Both a premium butcher and intimate dining concept all rolled into one, Victor Churchill’s Melbourne location is a must-visit for the steak-obsessed gourmand.
Unlike its sibling outpost in Sydney, Victor Churchill Melbourne includes a compact bar counter (at the rear of the shop), where obsessives of all things beefy can pull up a pew — to indulge in what must surely rank as some of the best steak in the entire country.
A lot of the shop’s take-home favourites (e.g. Kurobuta porchetta and rabbit terrine) can be cooked to order; but do yourself a favour, and skip straight to The Bar’s exclusives. Stone Axe’s wagyu longissimus dorsi — translation: the ‘eye’ of a ribeye — is a house favourite. Rich in marbling and succulent when cooked, it comes from a pair of muscles that are among the most underworked on an entire cow’s body. In essence: the epitome of good eating.
To pair, order a wedge salad and one (too many) Martinis, and you’ve got the makings of a formidably indulgent meal. Our expert tip? The Bar is that much easier to book at lunchtimes.
Address:Â 953 High Street, Armadale VIC 3143
Chef(s):Â Carl Walden
Opened: June, 2022
Price Guide:Â $$$$
Opening Hours: Monday (9 AM – 5 PM); Tuesday – Saturday (9 AM – 5 PM, 6 PM – 11 PM); Sunday (9 AM – 5 PM)
Bookings: Essential
A Hereford Beefstouw
For over 45 years, this top-quality Nordic-style restaurant has been revered by both Adelaide and Melbourne’s most discerning carnivores.
With a custom-built dry-ageing facility in South Australia, A Hereford Beefstouw exerts precise control over the quality of the meat they serve. And the standards here are very high indeed.
The restaurant’s signature dishes — whether you’re visiting in Melbourne or Adelaide — utilise Riverina beef that has been reared on a custom diet of Australian cereal/grains, for a minimum of 150 days. To really taste the difference (to your run-of-the-mill grass-fed bovine) we recommend ordering one of A Hereford Beefstouw’s ‘share steaks’: such as a 500-gram Chateaubriand or MBS2 tomahawk.
Address: 22 Duckboard Place, Melbourne VIC 3000
Chef(s): Daniel Groom
Opened: October 2016
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Monday – Tuesday (5:30 PM – 10:30 PM); Wednesday – Friday (11:30 AM – 10:30 PM); Saturday – Sunday (5:30 PM – 10:30 PM)
Bookings: Recommended
Rockpool Bar & Grill
Having cemented its acclaim since the days of Neil Perry, the legendary Rockpool Bar & Grill maintains a reputation as one of the best Australian steak restaurants in 2024. This, as many diners well know, is a brand that is all about consistency: in table setting, liveried waiters, and classically stiff cocktails.
Come steak night, you’ve got more than a few options here. There are, of course, the usual assortment of heavy hitters (how about a 400g sirloin of David Blackmore wagyu?). But if you’re in pursuit of variety, Rockpool is also capable of delivering on that front: with such crowd pleasers as free-range woodfired chicken or a whole Tasmanian rock lobster for all the pescatarians in the room.
Address: Crown Casino, 8 Whiteman Street, Southbank VIC 3006
Chef(s): Declan Carroll
Opened: July 2007
Price Guide: $$$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Wednesday (12 PM — 2:30 PM, 6 PM — 9 PM); Thursday ((12 PM — 2:30 PM, 6 PM — 9:30 PM); Friday — Saturday (12 PM — 2:30 PM, 6 PM — 10 PM); Sunday (12 PM — 2:30 PM, 6 PM — 9 PM)
Bookings: Recommended
The Lincoln
While The Lincoln isn’t all about serving the best steak in Melbourne per se, this neighbourhood publican is a credible operator when it comes to beef prepared in any number of ways.
For the last few years, there’s been a strong push in the kitchen toward seasonal, locally-sourced preparations. Cooks at The Lincoln also prioritise doing as much as they possibly can in-house: ranging from bacon, to the bread and pickles that grace every table.
As you’d expect, steaks here are sourced from a range of Australia’s most famed cattle grazing regions. At time of writing, diners can expect Tassie sirloin (courtesy of Cape Grim) or Gippsland’s finest in the form of O’Connor scotch fillet.
Address:Â 91 Cardigan Street, Carlton VIC 3053
Chef(s):Â Richard Hayes
Opened:Â
Price Guide:Â $$
Opening Hours: Monday – Sunday (12 PM – 12 AM)
Bookings:Â Not required
Grossi Florentino
As one of the best-known chefs in Melbourne, it’s unsurprising that Guy Grossi does a tidy sideline in some of the Victorian capital’s best steaks.
With its stylish Tuscan flourishes and emphasis (across many styles of dishes) on wood-fired cookery, Grossi Fiorentino also doubles up as one of our favourite quintessential Italian eateries in the city.
If you’re diverging from the restaurant’s stylish selection of pasta courses – think paccheri with sausage or brown butter tortelli – it had better be for bistecca. Of this particularly steaky section of the menu, a 1kg+ Fiorentina (i.e. a classic Florentine T-Bone) gets our juiciest stamp of approval. To maximise your party’s enjoyment, we also recommend getting a few choice sides (e.g. the asparagus ‘alla Fiorentina’) for the table.
Address: 80 Bourke St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Chef(s): Guy Grossi
Opened: March, 2013
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Monday – Saturday (8:30 AM – 10 PM)
Bookings: Essential
Grill Americano
Yet another buzzy, onyx-clad opening from Chris Lucas (who BH readers might also know from such upscale dining destinations as Society), Grill Americano is located in the thick of Flinders Lane – adjacent to a range of complementary dining and reveling hotspots.
A Melburnian play on the archetypal Manhattan grillroom, Americano’s main dining area is appropriately grand: swathed in a palette of cool blacks, greys, and royal blue. Such a setting makes for an effective backdrop to chophouse classics with an Italian inflection: think cotoletta alla milanese; grilled swordfish with capers; or centre-cut eye fillet, cooked on the sprawling open kitchen’s prized Josper grill.
Word to the wise: if you’re partial to a lick of dessert, save some room for the restaurant’s ‘Vanilla Meringata’: a combination of cake slices and whipped, sugary peaks that’s more than a little reminiscent of a similar Cipriani recipe.
Address: 112 Flinders Ln, Melbourne VIC 3000
Chef(s): Douglas Keyte
Opened: March, 2022
Price Guide: $$$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Friday (12 PM — 10 PM); Saturday — Sunday (11 PM — 10 PM)
Bookings: Recommended
Pascale Bar & Grill
Squirreled away in the vibrant Lacroix-esque confines of QT Melbourne, Pascale Bar & Grill is a steak restaurant worthy of its own special detour. To be sure: if you’re not an obsessive carnivore, there are the obligatory pastas and barbequed fish courses to choose from.
Although, many would argue that these are preludes to the eponymous ‘QT Ribeye’: 350 grams of dry-aged Riverina cattle cooked over ironbark and applewood, served alongside Café De Paris butter.
Supplement your steak with an order of Pascale’s popular polenta chips and call it a day.
Address: Level 1/133 Russell St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Chef(s): Paul Easson
Opened: September, 2016
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Tuesday — Saturday (6 PM — 10 PM)
Bookings: Not necessary
Botswana Butchery Melbourne
A well-known Kiwi import which has also opened satellite locations in Sydney and Canberra, you’ll find Botswana Butchery Melbourne at the ‘Paris end’ of Flinders Lane.
A sprawling multi-storey venue that (at peak) can handle up to 300 diners, this restaurant is well-known for its staggering array of premium butchery — sourced from Queensland, New South Wales, and a range of local Victorian producers. The best of these? In our view, the 1.6kg Rangers Valley Tomahawk: available, for your enjoyment with a staggering number of classic chophouse condiments.
If dining with a large party of friends or colleagues, this is one we’d heartily recommend.
Address: 66 Flinders Lane, Melbourne VIC 3000
Chef(s): Andrew Zdravkovski
Opened: May, 2022
Price Guide: $$$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Sunday (12 PM — 12 AM)
Bookings: Recommended
France-Soir
If you’ve got a craving for some of the best French food in Melbourne (never mind steak) then France-Soir should be front of mind. This South Yarra gem is something akin to the ‘Elder Statesman’ of the city’s French restaurant community — robust, authentic, satisfying to a fault.
At this perennially buzzy hotspot for cuisine française, you’ll so much more than just steak and fries on the menu. Blessedly, France-Soir do an excellent rendition of that bistro classic: working exclusively with pasture-fed O’Connor beef, a simple accompaniment of salad, thrice-cooked fries, and whatever your sauce of choice is.
That said, if you’re looking for a more regionally representative smattering of dishes, then consider putting your penchant for beef aside: in favour of quenelles, snails cooked in butter, or even oeuf meurette — an old-school entrée that takes bacon and eggs to the next level (courtesy of a reduced red wine sauce).
Address: 11 Toorak Rd, South Yarra VIC 3141
Chef(s): Geraud Fabre
Opened: May, 2022
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Sunday (12 PM — 12 AM)
Bookings: Essential
Entrecôte
When it comes to bistros and brasseries, Melburnian diners have almost too great an assortment to choose from (it’d be fair to say that locals all have their favourites). That said, if you wanted to cut straight through to crowd favourites, you could do a lot worse than Entrecôte: a shoo-in for Melbourne’s best steak, originally opened in 2015.
Inspired by the legendary Parisian steakhouse Le Relais D’Entrecôte, there are a wide array of menus here to satisfy your craving for sustenance at most hours of the day.
Over the years, diners have breathlessly sung the praises of the restaurant’s eponymous ‘Entrecôte Steak Frites’, yet for very greedy gourmands, you can actually order this as part of a 3-course tasting menu — pitched at the not-unreasonable fee of $104.90.
Entrecôte’s bar menu (served exclusively to walk-in customers) is also well worth exploring: full to bursting with its own culinary surprises like veal cordon bleu or the ritziest of caviar services, complete with a Martini.
Address: 142-144 Greville St, Prahran VIC 3181
Chef(s):
Opened: January, 2015
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Sunday (12 PM — 12 AM)
Bookings: Essential
Angus & Bon
Often touted as one of the best value propositions in Prahran, Angus & Bon breaks with many of its contemporaries in South Yarra; offering up choice cuts of beef and seafood in the style of a typical New York steakhouse.
The moody oaken dining room offers an unobtrusive backdrop to Angus & Bon’s North American-inspired menu: replete with Glacier 51 toothfish, ‘southern fried’ chicken tenders, and a bevvy of side dishes that wouldn’t look out of place at your nearest chapter of Peter Luger’s.
Where a majority of the best steak restaurants in Melbourne focus (understandably) on local beef from Gippsland, the dearest options for grilling here are supplied by Eight Blossom: Wagyu specialists from the Darling Downs in Queensland, who have supplied Angus & Bon with juicy and intensely flavourful scotch fillet that score high on the marbling index.
Address: 142-144 Greville St, Prahran VIC 3181
Chef(s): Jeremy Sutphin
Opened: January, 2018
Price Guide: $$
Opening Hours: Tuesday — Friday (4 PM — 11 PM); Saturday — Sunday (12 PM — 11 PM)
Bookings: Essential
Steer Dining Room
Staying in South Yarra for another of our favourites, Steer Dining Room offers one of the top steak dinners in Melbourne — ditto if you’re the kind of carnivore who will only settle for the very best in full blood Aussie or Japanese-bred Wagyu. After all, the restaurant’s philosophy, publicly enshrined, is that “fine steak should be treated as preciously as caviar.”
Steer has one of the most comprehensive selections of Melbourne steaks you can find: not just in the city, but pretty much in the entirety of Australia. That fastidious approach is reflected in the restaurant’s, how shall we put this, not-insubstantial pricing. Just 300g of Ozaki ‘Denver’ (i.e. boneless short rib) will set you back $300; while the infamously chocolate-fed Wagyu of Mayura Station start at $199. ‘Meat sweats’ doesn’t even begin to cut it.
It’s notable (and impressive) that despite these prices, Steer still commands a legion of eaters — at home and abroad. It even managed to crack the ranks of the ‘World’s 101 Best Steak Restaurants’ in 2023: quite the feat when you’re up against some of the beefiest eateries in Europe and North America.
Address: 142-144 Greville St, Prahran VIC 3181
Chef(s): Jeremy Sutphin
Opened: January, 2018
Price Guide: $$
Opening Hours: Tuesday — Friday (4 PM — 11 PM); Saturday — Sunday (12 PM — 11 PM)
Bookings: Essential
The Railway Club Hotel
When it comes to grabbing a hearty value-driven steak, most Melburnian pubs offer a fairly solid rendition. But The Railway Club Hotel, often referred to as the original steak pub of Melbourne, is a little more than your average publican.
Here, you’ll often find a few unexpected items on the menu: green curry or lamb’s fry anyone? But steak? That’s a constant on the Railway Club’s menu. For those with a monstrous appetite, a 400-gram Cape Grim porterhouse should be first port of call; or perhaps a T-bone by The Vintage Beef Co — if you’re partial to an Antipodean take on steaks made from vaca vieja (“old cow”).
Address: 107 Raglan St, Port Melbourne VIC 3207
Chef(s): Prakash Chalise
Opened:
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Thursday (12 PM — 12 AM); Friday — Saturday (12 PM — 1 AM); Sunday (12 PM — 12 AM)
Bookings: Recommended
Steak Ministry Bar & Grill
If you’re looking for bovine delights beyond the confine of the Melbourne CBD, then consider heading to Glen Waverley — home to Steak Ministry Bar & Grill. This upscale steakhouse has become a fast favourite for denizens of Melbourne’s southeast, revered primarily for its slow-cooked pork ribs and locally reared Sher Wagyu. A tomahawk of the stuff can weigh as much as 2.8kg, cut to order and garnished with the restaurant’s signature ‘French onion gel’.
Beef may well be the main attraction, but like any steak restaurant worth its chops (pun intended) the seafood starters here behoove further investigation. The lobster bisque and Louisiana crab cake, by way of example, meet with our BH seal of approval.
Address: 39-51 Kingsway, Glen Waverley VIC 3150
Chef(s): Chris Wade
Opened: June, 2014
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Thursday (5 PM — 10 PM); Friday — Sunday (12 PM — 3 PM, 5 PM — 10 PM)
Bookings: Essential
Middle Park Hotel
Yet another historically significant publican that Melburnians can’t seem to get enough of, Middle Park Hotel first opened in 1889. In the ensuing century-and-a-half, it has evolved into a restaurant and boutique accommodation: a beacon of constancy for locals in the inner city.
There are the usual assortment of neat’n’tidy steaks, but you may as well go the whole hog and order the 1.4kg tomahawk. Rangers Valley’s answer to the Ozaki Wagyu-type strains of the world, this is marbled Aussie beef at its finest: purebred Black Angus that is grain-fed for 270 days and then, after slaughtering, dry-aged for another 150.
Round up three or four equally ravenous diners, order this; and then get stuck in with a heaping helping of roasted bone marrow and Middle Park’s famously addictive skin-on fries.
Address: 102 Canterbury Rd, Middle Park VIC 3206
Chef(s):Â
Opened: 1889
Price Guide:Â $$$
Opening Hours: Monday — Sunday (12 PM — Late)
Bookings: Recommended
Vlado’s Charcoal Grill
Very nearly a portal to what Melbourne steak restaurants must have looked like circa 1960, Vlado’s is variously described by Richmond residents as an “icon” or “institution” — and with good reason.
In the ensuing 60 years, the restaurant has never once deviated from its overwhelmingly carnivorous four-course menu. The only agency you’ll exert, in the course of a meal here, pertains to what cut of beef you most fancy for mains: rump, eye fillet, or porterhouse. In an amusing twist, the humble grilled capsicum occupies the role of a seasonal dish (according to the menu, it is offered “when available”).
Meanwhile, the wine list careens aggressively in the direction of big boozy reds with a stable of established Shiraz makers (e.g. Leeuwin Estate and Levantine Hill). Fitting, considering the classic no-nonsense approach of this decades-old family establishment.
Address: 61 Bridge Rd, Richmond VIC 3121
Chef(s):Â Michael Gregyrek
Opened: 1964
Price Guide:Â $$$
Opening Hours: Wednesday (6 PM — 10:30 PM); Thursday — Friday (12 PM — 2 PM, 6 PM — 10:30 PM); Saturday (6 PM — 10:30 PM)
Bookings: Essential
La Luna Bistro
A restaurant that must have felt ahead of its time, upon first opening in the 1990s, La Luna is equally well-known amongst Melburnians who love steak and high-quality small goods.
Today, Chef Adrian Richardson and Angelo Marchetti (La Luna’s very own in-house butcher) continue in this tradition; with a range of smoked/cured meats for your delectation. (Marchetti’s prosciutto, aged in-house for two years, is especially addictive.)
Naturally, all of this feels like a prelude to the restaurant’s selection of cuts for the grill. All within the 200-550-gram range, La Luna’s steaks are dry-aged in house for a minimum of 60 days; served with simple fixings of jus, chimichurri, or Café de Paris butter. It’s a real ‘say less’ approach: and certainly one that we can get behind.
Address: 320 Rathdowne St, Carlton North VIC 3054
Chef(s):Â Adrian Richardson
Opened: September, 1998
Price Guide:Â $$$
Opening Hours:  Tuesday — Thursday (4 PM — 11 PM); Friday — Saturday (12 PM — 3 PM, 4 PM — 11 PM)
Bookings: Essential
San Telmo
Stepping into San Telmo, diners might well get the sense that they’ve be transported to a lively asado (Argentinian barbeque) specialist in the heart of Buenos Aires.
Famed for its impressive 2.5-metre-long parrilla, San Telmo’s chief attraction rests in the seafood and land-based proteins that are cooked on this aforementioned traditional Argentinian grill.
The kitchen here are huge proponents for local O’Connor beef; and we, at Boss Hunting, can think of few better ways to spend an evening in Melbourne, than over San Telmo’s widely delicious entraña (“hanger steak”) and, to finish, some addictive dulce de leche-filled cookies.
With its tall ceilings and exposed brickwork, the atmosphere here in the evenings can often be electric; and that’s even before you start ordering from San Telmo’s appropriately curated wine list: full of delicious gems like the Caipirinha and even a few vintage Pedro Ximénez sherries.
Address: 14 Meyers Place, Melbourne VIC 3000
Chef(s): Marcelo Narvaez
Opened: 2011
Price Guide: $$$
Opening Hours: Tuesday – Wednesday (12 PM – 10 PM); Thursday (12 PM – 10:30PM); Friday – Saturday (12PM – 11PM); Sunday (12 PM – 10 PM)
Bookings: Recommended
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