Correction (1 October 2026): an earlier version of this page was generated from map listings. It repeated Google star ratings, review counts and snippets of Google reviews, described each kitchen in words nobody had checked, labelled everything “verified March 2026”, and counted places in Moonee Ponds, Essendon Fields and Essendon North as Essendon restaurants. It has been rewritten, and every place below was checked against its own current website and menu, plus a second independent listing.
The best restaurant in Essendon depends on the question: brekkie on a weekday, a slow Turkish dinner, a pizza on a Monday, or a steak. The suburb answers most of them within a few streets. Fletcher Street holds two Turkish kitchens, Alya at number 55 and Bodrum at number 51. Mt Alexander Road carries Hugo Dining’s wood-fired oven and Chef Sofra’s char-grill. Tutti Trattoria is on Napier Street, and Squires Loft is on Buckley Street.
This roundup sorts them by occasion, gives a price band where the venue publishes a menu online, and picks one menu highlight per place with its listed price. Where a venue publishes no current prices, the entry says so rather than guessing.
By occasion: the quick picks
| Occasion | Head to | Menu highlight | Listed price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Breakfast or a weekday lunch | Alya Restaurant, Café & Bar | Turkish-style menemen | Not published online |
| Slow-cooked lamb, Thursday to Sunday | Bodrum Essendon | Wood-fired kuzu tandir | $39 |
| A BYO meze and grill night | Chef Sofra | Adana kebap | $28 |
| Pasta or pizza, including Mondays | Tutti Trattoria | Vodka pasta | $32 |
| Wood-fired pizza | Hugo Dining | Margherita | $25 |
| Steak | Squires Loft Essendon | 28-day wet-aged beef | Ring for current prices |
Alya Restaurant, Café & Bar — 55 Fletcher St, Essendon VIC 3040
This is the Essendon restaurant people search for by name, and its own website shows it trading at 55 Fletcher Street with breakfast, lunch, dinner and cocktails. The kitchen pairs the flavours of Turkey with modern cafe classics. Mornings run from eggs on sourdough and smashed avo to Turkish-style menemen and the full Turkish breakfast. Lunch adds gozleme, manti and falafel alongside burgers, bowls, pastas and salads.
Menemen is eggs cooked soft in a pan of tomato, green peppers and spice, eaten straight from the pan with bread. A full Turkish breakfast is traditionally a table of small plates rather than one dish. Dinner is Friday and Saturday nights only, according to Alya’s own site, and it is closed on Mondays.
By occasion: breakfast, or a long weekday lunch; book ahead for a Friday or Saturday dinner. Price band: not published. The menu link on its website showed a “page not found” message on 1 October 2026, so there are no prices to quote. Ring +61 432 555 560 before you go. Menu highlight: Turkish-style menemen, as listed on its homepage.
Bodrum Essendon — 51 Fletcher St, Essendon VIC 3040
Bodrum describes itself as a Turkish wood-fired and Mediterranean restaurant, and the menu is built around that oven. The signature is the wood-fired kuzu tandir at $39: lamb shank and ribs slow-cooked for six hours over the fire, served with salad, yoghurt and Turkish bread. Ali nazik kebab, also $39, puts slow-cooked lamb on smoked eggplant and garlic yoghurt with burnt butter. Kunefe ($20) is the dessert to leave room for: shredded kataifi pastry wrapped around a stretchy cheese, soaked in syrup and topped with pistachio.
It opens Thursday to Sunday only, with lunch on Saturdays and Sundays and dinner from 5.30pm; Monday to Wednesday it is closed.
By occasion: a long dinner for two or a group; the meat platter is $55 per person, for two people or more. Price band: mains $35 to $44 on its own menu. Menu highlight: wood-fired kuzu tandir, $39.
Chef Sofra — 1021-1023 Mt Alexander Rd, Essendon VIC 3040
“Provincial Turkish Cuisine” is how Chef Sofra’s own site puts it, open Tuesday to Sunday from 5.30pm. The menu is a long list of cold and warm mezes, then the char-grill. The Adana kebap ($28) is seasoned lamb mince grilled on flat skewers and served with lavash bread, onion salad, tomato and hot pepper; the style is named for the city of Adana in southern Turkey. Manti ($21) are little dumplings with a spicy lamb filling under garlic yoghurt and tomato sauce. For two, the mix grill platter is $77: lamb and chicken skewers, lamb cutlets and kofte with rice and grilled vegetables.
By occasion: a group dinner with a bottle you brought. It is BYO wine only, with $9 corkage, per its menu. Price band: grill mains $28 (kofte or Adana kebap) to $40 (four lamb cutlets). Menu highlight: Adana kebap, $28.
Tutti Trattoria — 18 Napier St, Essendon VIC 3040
Tutti’s own site promises old-school Italian favourites and crispy New York-style pizza, and it is the one place on this list whose own pages display hours for all seven days, Monday included. The vodka pasta ($32) is fusilli in the house vodka sauce with a touch of chilli, finished with burrata and toasted parmesan crumbs. Pizzas come two ways: a New York-style margherita is $28 and serves one or two, while the square pie version is $45 and serves two to four. Chicken parmigiano is on the menu too, at $32 with fries and a garden salad. The menu marks which dishes are halal or have a halal option.
By occasion: a Monday night, or a table of four splitting a square pie. Price band: pastas $29 (carbonara) to $40 (spaghetti al marinara). Menu highlight: vodka pasta, $32.
Hugo Dining — 1116-1118 Mount Alexander Rd, Essendon VIC 3040
Hugo’s site leads with wood-fired pizza and handmade pasta, and the menu backs it up. A margherita of tomato, buffalo mozzarella, fior di latte and basil is $25. Cavatelli lamb ragu ($36) is hand-cut pasta shells with slow-cooked lamb shoulder, red wine and rosemary. If a midweek night in is the plan, its takeaway deal is any three pizzas plus zeppole for $49, Tuesday to Thursday, pick-up only and not through Uber or DoorDash. It is closed on Mondays and, per its own FAQ, is not BYO.
By occasion: date night, or a midweek pizza pick-up for the house. Price band: pastas $34 (rigatoni carbonara) to $49 (fettuccine lobster). Menu highlight: margherita, $25.
Squires Loft Essendon — 131 Buckley St, Essendon VIC 3040
“The Steak Specialists” is the line on Squires Loft’s own site, which says all its beef goes through a 28-day wet-ageing period and that it has been serving Essendon for more than 12 years as part of the Squires Loft steakhouse group. Wet ageing means the beef rests vacuum-sealed and chilled for weeks, which lets its own enzymes tenderise the meat. The menu file its site links is dated 2024, so this entry carries no prices.
By occasion: a steak night; bookings are taken through its site. Price band: ring (03) 9331 1230 for current prices. Menu highlight: the wet-aged steak the venue is named for.
If you only try one: make it Bodrum’s wood-fired kuzu tandir at $39, the dish its menu calls its signature: six hours over a wood fire. On a Monday, Tutti Trattoria is the pick whose own pages display Monday hours.
The earlier version of this page listed 31 places, 20 with full entries and 11 more in a short table. This one keeps six whose details we could check at their own sources. Leaving a place out is not a verdict on it.
Quick answers
What are the best restaurants in Essendon?
By occasion: Alya Restaurant, Café & Bar on Fletcher Street for breakfast and lunch, Bodrum Essendon on Fletcher Street for wood-fired lamb, Chef Sofra on Mt Alexander Road for a BYO Turkish meze and grill night, Tutti Trattoria on Napier Street and Hugo Dining on Mt Alexander Road for pizza and pasta, and Squires Loft on Buckley Street for steak.
Is Alya Restaurant Cafe Bar in Essendon open for dinner?
Only on Friday and Saturday nights, according to its own website. Alya, at 55 Fletcher Street, is open 8am to 3pm Tuesday to Thursday and Sunday, 8am to 11:30pm on Friday and 8am to 11pm on Saturday, and is closed on Monday.
What is on the Alya Restaurant Cafe Bar menu?
Its website describes Turkish flavours alongside modern cafe classics: eggs on sourdough, smashed avo, Turkish-style menemen and the full Turkish breakfast in the morning; burgers, bowls, gozleme, pastas, salads, manti and falafel at lunch; and seafood, slow-cooked meats and house pastas at dinner. Its menu link showed a “page not found” message on 1 October 2026, so we could not quote prices.
Where can I get a steak dinner in Essendon?
Squires Loft at 131 Buckley Street calls itself “The Steak Specialists” and says all its beef is wet-aged for 28 days; its online menu file dates from 2024, so ring (03) 9331 1230 for current prices. Hugo Dining lists a grass-fed eye fillet at $49 and a rib eye at $55, and Tutti Trattoria a 300g Tasmanian scotch fillet at $59.
Which Essendon restaurants are BYO?
Chef Sofra on Mt Alexander Road is BYO wine only, with $9 corkage, according to its menu. Hugo Dining says on its own site that it is not BYO. For the others, ask when you book.
Which Essendon restaurants are open on a Monday?
Of the six here, Tutti Trattoria is the one whose own pages display Monday hours, 5pm to 10pm. Alya and Hugo Dining list Monday as closed, Bodrum is closed Monday to Wednesday, and Chef Sofra opens Tuesday to Sunday. Squires Loft’s pages do not display opening hours, so ring ahead.
How we checked
On 1 October 2026 we read each venue’s own website and menu page and copied every item and price exactly as printed. Chef Sofra’s menu prints prices as bare numbers; we used only prices that are the same everywhere they appear on the page. Squires Loft’s only menu file online is dated 2024, so we used none of its prices, and Alya’s menu link was not working, so we used none there either. We confirmed each address at a second, independent source: the Australian Good Food Guide, Curateria or DoorDash’s store page. We did not use delivery-app prices, Google ratings or review counts. Opening hours are as each venue lists them on its own site; public holidays and private functions can change them. The photos are illustrative, from Unsplash: they show the kind of dish, not the venue’s own food.
Seen something out of date? Email [email protected] with the page link and what has changed, and we will check it again.
Sources
- Alya Restaurant, Café & Bar: alya.net.au and contact page; address also at AGFG
- Bodrum Essendon: bodrumessendon.com.au and its menu; address also at AGFG
- Chef Sofra: chefsofra.com.au, its menu and contact page; address also at AGFG
- Tutti Trattoria: ciaotutti.au and its menu; address also at Curateria
- Hugo Dining: hugodining.com.au, its menu and pizza takeaway deal; address also at AGFG and DoorDash
- Squires Loft Essendon: squiresloftessendon.com.au and its contact page; address also at AGFG
