‘We need this in Melbourne now’: Hatted trattoria opens a more casual and affordable spin-off

There is a place, a magical place, where you can buy affordable wine to drink at the bar, chat over some cheese and crostini, take your half-drunk bottle home for dinner, or keep grazing until you realise it’s time for dessert. It’s called an enoteca – Italy’s ultra-relaxed version of a Melbourne wine bar – and a freshly minted one, Enoteca Zingara, just landed on Brunswick Street.

It’s the casual sibling to Alta Trattoria, a short walk away, which opened last year and immediately received a Good Food hat. Zingara, opening on April 26, has the same standards (and the same chef, McKay Wilday), but is far more approachable.

Wines by the glass max out at $20, most seats are at the marble-topped bar where waiters will plate up the food, and snacks hover around $12. Larger dishes are between $28 and $30.

“I think we all need this in Melbourne right now,” says Alta co-founder James Tait. “Something value-driven, where people feel comfortable and don’t need to spend a million bucks.”

A big reference point was Osteria Alla Concorrenza in Milan, where patrons cram in around shelves of wine for simple snacks, such as salumi sliced to order, or humble dishes such as braised venison.

“When we signed the lease on here and came up with the concept, an Italian friend told me, ‘This venue already exists, James! It’s in Milan’,” Tait laughs.

At Zingara, chef Wilday is embracing his love of bread, baking ciabatta, pizza and regional breads.

“Having this does spread my wings and creativity to show how beautiful and diverse Italy is, especially through bread. There are thousands of breads in Italy,” he says.

One is crescentina Modenese, small rounds like English muffins that are cooked on a special iron at Zingara that imprints an emblem on top – and result in piping hot bread slathered with whipped lardo (a type of cured pork).

These join a Ligurian style of pizza known as sardenaira that’s free of cheese but piled with tomato and salty things, including capers and olives. Then there’s the crostini menu, a regional tour of Italy powered by ciabatta. Toppings include whipped salt cod (Venice), chicken livers and pickled onions (Tuscany) and raw veal sausage spiced with nutmeg and clove (Piedmont).

“We’re just taking McKay’s bread and putting it into the best snacks we can do from Italy,” says Tait.

Bread even steals the show in Zingara’s meatballs, helping to create the light texture that Wilday was taught by his partner’s nonna.

A humble thread runs through the menu, whether it’s a riff on vitello tonnato that uses rabbit instead of veal, or chickpea pancakes topped with slivers of terrine made from pig’s head.

On the wine list, you’ll find “Italian workhorse varieties”, says Tait, such as perricone, an indigenous Sicilian grape. Plus every bottle on the shelf is priced for retail, with $25 corkage added.

The name is Italian for gypsy and honours the past tenant, Gypsy Bar, part of an earlier wave of casual, quality bars in Melbourne that let you come as you are.

Open from Friday, April 26 Mon & Thu-Fri 4pm-late, Sat & Sun noon-1am.