The Lincoln

The Lincoln has stood on the corner of Cardigan and Faraday Streets in Carlton since the nineteenth century, and it is the kind of pub that keeps winning things quietly - Pub of the Year at the Time Out Melbourne Pub Awards, Hotel of the Year from Australian Bartender, a Critic's Pick in The Age Good Food Guide. Iain and Stella Ling took it over in late 2014 and left the bones alone: tiled floors, a fireplace, a dining room hung with prints, and a bar that treats a drinks list as something to write rather than stock.

That habit is why it belongs in this guide. The single-page drinks list carries a heading marked ZERO ALC., and the drinks under it are built from the same pantry as the cocktails above. Elderflower soda comes with lime and mint; the fizzy spiced pineapple is finished with chamomile, honey and lemon; the Wild Mother raspberry shrub is cut with cider vinegar and soda, which gives it the acid a good non-alcoholic drink needs; and there is a yuzu and peach tea lengthened with soda and lemon. All four are A$10, which is roughly half what a cocktail costs here. Above them sits a Gruppetto L'aperitivo non-alcoholic Veneziano spritz at A$15 and T.I.N.A 2.0, raspberry fruit and leaf with jasmine pearl green tea.

The packaged side is properly stocked rather than token: a NON-ALC TINNIES <0.5% ABV block listing Drivers non-alc lager, Carlton Zero, Hiatus premium pacific pale ale or lager, Heaps Normal XPA, Willie Smith's non-alcoholic apple cider and Guinness Draught 0.0, plus three non-alcoholic sodas - Mateo sparkling yerba mate, Notto Blotto hopped soda by Moo Brew, and Strangelove very mandarin. Practically, it is a pub rather than a bar: kitchen hours, a Sunday roast, and enough room that a group where half are drinking and half are not can sit comfortably. Cardigan Street is a five-minute walk from Melbourne University and the Lygon Street strip.