Pub: Builders Arms Hotel
Where: 211 Gertrude St., Fitzroy
Phone: 9419 0818
Date: 1 May 2009
Score: 15/20

You stand outside this pub and challenge yourself to go in.

In spite of its location in the coolest street in Victoria (at the moment), you do a quick revision of this street in your mind of its history; it makes for bleak recollection.

Champion Hotel one corner; Rob Roy diagonally opposite. Feared hotels where the well bred did not meet the well read. Ne’er-do-wells aplenty staring at you uneasily.

Short walk easterly was the venereal disease clinic. Pox to you. Austere, menacing uninviting; heck if you’ve got something wrong downstairs, you had to carry it rather than be sprung going in there.

Fast forward to now. Ah, a breath of inner urban gentrification to a street I thought would never be so revived and what was old and ugly there, is now chic, desirable and cool.

And so it is with The Builders Arms, one of the best pubs I have been to in ages. Although a first time visit from me, it has garnered a wonderful reputation with a heady mix of cutting edge pub grub with old school hospitality.

The outside reflects the past with sandy coloured tiles rising from the footpath to an off white façade being the main colour of the exterior. Tables and chairs with shade offer a place of comfort on Gertrude St.

Go on, walk inside. Stunning old front bar and, here’s the first of goodies – the beer was outstanding and I reckon it was the first from the tap for the day.

It is “pub” dark inside, red/black colours, but not eerie by any means as the twists and turns of the large interior lead you to booths and tables. It is easy to be comfortable.

Through a passage way and out to the wonderful, shady beer garden, enclosed by the surrounding buildings and the time passes quickly and you enjoy your Supertramp, “Crisis what crisis”, moment over a Stella or Coopers.

But it is the wonderfully priced food served in the impossibly glamorous red/white bistro that the real highlights kick in. Small menu for sure, and the meals will cause you to think, but they are excellent.

Salty cod, mash potato dip ($12) with the best bread for scooping it up shames all predecessors carrying similar title.  Rabbit, bacon, leek pie ($22) screamed look at me as it found its way to another table.

Mussels, cooked in a broth of Bulmers cider ($19) had a flavour the like of which I haven’t tasted previously; Mussels are THE pub dish of 2009.

What about 4 types of mushrooms, truffled egg yolk atop a slab of brioche ($13) for a main?

In 14 years I haven’t seen this dish amongst the 1000s of parma and burger options but there it was – tried, and wickedly delicious and rich. Potted crab and watercress ($13) tells you that they are prepared to push a boundary as far as pub-life goes and even though Kurt has left (one of Melbourne’s best chefs) Tim, who plied his trade at the high-achieving Court House in North Melbourne carries the tradition seamlessly.

The wine list is small in number and far from recognisable: Good. $30 will secure a bottle unlikely to be seen at your local BWS.

Lunch is a late in the week affair, dinner most nights and on Sunday they will do a roast, but if their bistro menu is anything to go by, I can’t see the meal to miss Tom Cruise going to the formcard.

I loved it. A real contender in the race for the DeBortoli 2009 Pub of the Year.