Mrs Singh
Year
2020
Client
Jessie Singh
Service
Culinary Direction · Launch
A modern Indian wine bar that earned a four-star Good Food review. Cross-cultural by practice, not by trend — years before the wider Melbourne scene caught up.
© Mrs Singh
Context
Mrs Singh was a modern Indian wine bar on Flinders Lane — built around playful cross-cultural cooking, accessible wine direction, and the kind of energy that earns repeat visits.
The brief: prove Indian food could live inside a Melbourne wine-bar format without losing identity. Punjab via Paris. New York meets New Delhi. Mumbai dances with Melbourne.
What I built
A menu structured around dish-and-wine logic: small plates that worked with texture, fat and acid; large plates that anchored a bottle. Indian flavour as the foundation, technique as the lens.
The butter chicken crème brûlée — chicken liver pâté built with tomato, ginger, garlic and fenugreek, finished with a shatter-crisp sugar shell, served with garlic truffle naan — became one of the dishes the Good Food review built its argument around.
Signature moment
The four-star Good Food review by Dani Valent. “Mrs Singh has sashayed in and made herself instantly essential.” Herald Sun followed with 14.5/20 and “the cure for every too-cool inner-city wine bar.”
Outcome
Mrs Singh proved the cross-cultural lane existed in the work years before it became a Melbourne trend. It remains one of the strongest standalone receipts in the file.
Press
“It's playful and unique. New York meets New Delhi. Punjab does Paris. Mumbai dances with Melbourne.” — Dani Valent, The Age / Good Food, Mar 2020 (4★)
“Mrs Singh is the cure for every too-cool inner-city wine bar. It's restorative, relaxed and a whole lot of fun.” — Dan Stock, Herald Sun, Feb 2020 (14.5/20)
Collaborate.
Polepole / Glamp