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MELBOURNE | Dunning Kruger is a small bar that’s opened where “Sam’s” fruit and veg hole in the wall store used to be on Lygon Street and Brunswick East, and sees the space transformed into something very different. The name, if you were wondering, isn’t that of one of the owners (that’d be Gene Mills and Courtney Tuul), but rather a reference to the “Dunning-Kruger Effect” – a cognitive bias wherein people of low ability suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their cognitive ability as greater than it is. In fact the bar’s logo is a confidence versus competence graph from Dunning and Kruger’s original 1999 study. We’re sure there’s a reference to wanting to open a bar somewhere in there.
The philosophy at Dunning Kruger is simple – a local’s neighbourhood bar with a focus on Victorian beer, Australian wine, small producers and “damn good pie”. It’s a simple space with a few cushioned spots, a few seats and tables and the bar. A record player spins an eclectic selection of vinyl – The Smiths and D’Angelo when we first visited, and it’s all very homely and welcoming.
There’s beer on tap and bottles four red wines, and four whites, along with a few sparklings and a rose. All wines are available by the glass which is a something we really appreciate. The spirits selection is impressive too. After enjoying a Mornington Pale we were intrigued by the bottles lining the shelf behind the bar and asked Mills if he could make us a cocktail using one of the spirits we hadn’t tried. After a bit of a discussion about some of the small batch spirits from around the world on offer, we ended up settling on Chicago based Koval Distillery Barreled Gin on the rocks.
For food, well it’s all about the pies. Tuul is a trained pastry chef and bakes at least two sweet, American-style pies daily. We haven’t tried the pies yet (it was just before dinner when we visited), but let’s just say the smell coming out of the small oven behind the bar is very alluring. Think lime and maple custard, apple, rhubarb and blueberry. If you want something that’s not a pie, there’s also olives, pretzels, smoked almonds and cheeseboards from Harper & Blohm.
Dunning Kruger
436 Lygon Street
Brunswick East
Victoria 3057
Australia
Telephone: n/a
E-mail: [email protected]
Website
Open
Mon – Sun: 3:00pm to 11:00pm