Just Open: Blue Tongue Wine Bar, Elwood

Rabih Yanni​ refuses to indulge superstition. It was Friday, November 13, when his recently purchased Elwood wine bar burnt down after one day of trade. Five months later, it reopened on April Fool's Day – no joke.

This is Blue Tongue Wine Bar 2.0, a reinvention of a reinvention.

Yanni, who also owns the Grosvenor Hotel in St Kilda, bought the site with floor manager Nic Gordon and head chef Sebastian McQuarrie. The trio intended to continue renovating the space over 18 months before a rude awakening by the fire brigade at 6am.

After a full rebuild it's still a charming local wine bar. They have dragged it into 2016: a smart-casual space that leans towards the dinner-date crowd earlier in the week and a party crowd at weekends.

McQuarrie's menu is meat-driven thanks to a custom-built charcoal grill. Steaks, from eye fillet to chateaubriand, are the star of the show, and there's a short selection of house-made pasta – think ravioli filled with snapper and prawns in tomato and chilli oil.

Small plates – "not tapas", McQuarrie assures us – are geared towards grazing: perhaps a plate of sugar-cured, cucumber-wrapped scallops in a slightly nutty celery emulsion.

Open Sun-Thu 11am-11pm; Fri-Sat 11am-midnight.

62 Ormond Road, Elwood, 03 9531 2562