Sidebar

On Melrose Street in bayside Sandringham, Sidebar plays two roles at once — part wine store, part neighbourhood bar — and does both with an easy lack of ceremony. Pull up a seat and drink on site, or lean on the team's wine-procurement service to track down bottles for the cellar at home; either way the emphasis is on discovery rather than a fixed list. A short menu of food rounds out the drinking, and the room takes on private functions when the occasion calls for it. The hours have their own bayside logic — mid-afternoon into the evening from Wednesday to Saturday, and a gentler Sunday session that winds up, in the bar's own words, not so late. It's a genuine local: a place to buy a good bottle and stay for a glass of it.