Banh mi martini? This westside bar looks like an antique shop, but its drinks are totally new

When searching for one of Footscray’s newest bars online, it can take a second to find what you’re looking for. Second Hand Dealer doesn’t have the most Google-friendly name.

It can also be tricky to find IRL, if you’re not familiar with its home of Barkly Street. You could, like my mates, mistake the neighbouring craft-beer cornucopia Bar Josephine as your destination, because of all the action in the front window.

But I was waiting for them next door, hidden behind a blacked-out frontage that’s scrawled with the words “cocktail bar”, giving very little away from the street.

Moving inside, through a candlelit entryway where dripping wax has hardened into stalactites, the Second Hand Dealer moniker immediately makes sense.

It’s like a poky, hodgepodge antique shop that’s been pried open to have a bar plonked in its centre. Old-timey portraits glare at you from the walls, vintage lampshades create golden pockets, and every surface is touched with tchotchkes (on the bar top sits a resin hippo, its mouth so agape it’s become a makeshift tip jar).

If not for the building’s remaining exterior signage, you’d hardly believe this used to be Pie Thief, the bakery known for putting interesting things inside pastry, like lasagne.

After closing the popular shop and selling the Pie Thief business name in 2024, founder Aaron Donato, who also owns Bar Josephine, decided to apply a similar ethos – “what’s a great meal and can we turn it into a pie?” – to the world of cocktails.

It’s like a poky, hodgepodge antique shop that’s been pried open to have a bar plonked in its centre.

Peak experimentation comes in the form of a banh mi martini. The surrounding streets of Footscray are home to some of Melbourne’s best Vietnamese pork rolls, and Donato has tried his best to funnel their essence into a drink he’s dubbed the Banh M(artin)i.

The menu reads: “Roast pork, pâté, butter, carrot, cucumber, coriander. Oh, and gin, vodka, vermouth. We swear this is a drink.” It arrives at our booth with a full explanation of how it’s made, built on a base of fat-washed vodka, courtesy of roast pork and pâté, that’s been thrice-filtered for clarity. “Six banh mis died so we could have this,” my mate remarks.

The verdict? Less porky, more pickle-y. Capped with a coil of pickled carrot and a few drops of coriander oil, it’s relatively clear and crisp, tasting most of a banh mi’s garnishes. While not the flavour bomb I was expecting, it’s a martini I’d order again.

The Night-Time Coco Pops is a drink that fancifies (and fortifies) the chocolatey cereal milk you’d slurp from your brekkie bowl as a kid. It’s one of several cocktails born from Donato’s obsession with clarification: a process that uses milk, citrus or filtration to render a drink transparent yet still rich-tasting.

This one is a milk punch powered by Starward whisky and coffee liqueur, with a nutty hit of macadamia, and a slimline chocolate crackle placed precariously on the glass. Just as nostalgic is the vintage Arnott’s coaster it’s served on.

There’s plenty to pique your interest at Second Hand Dealer. But even at 8pm on a Friday, it’s nowhere near as busy as it could be. Or as its sibling, Bar Josephine, is.

Maybe that’s because it’s easy to miss on the street. Or because it’s flown somewhat under the radar since it opened in November. Or because a clarified Bloody Mary isn’t everyone’s cup of ... er ... tea.

Rest assured, you can keep it simple if that’s more your speed. Go for a local pilsner, a wine from the blackboard or a $14 limoncello spritz. There’s also a whole page dedicated to “classic cocktails, classically twisted”, with the tequila-based Carajillo standing in for the espresso martini.

Footscray is flush with bars for all occasions, and this is a worthy addition to the west – whether for date night in the low-lit main bar, a group takeover of one of the big booths out back, or just to try the latest oddball concoction.

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