5 Reasons why the new Newmarket is not as good as the old Newmarket

1.         The door-bitch

I rolled up to the new Newmarket on Friday night only to be confronted by your quintessential door-bitch (i.e. a girl in her early 30’s, overly made up), holding a clipboard who insists “the Newmarket is a restaurant, not a bar” and without a booking, we couldn’t get in.  The old Newmarket had no door bitch and anyone could get in to do whatever the fuck they wanted (drink, eat, watch a strip-show, play pool, take a piss, shoot up smack, whatever). 

2.         The food

I’ve been to Mamasita and its inspiration La Esquina in New York, both of which are incredible places with highly memorable food. I also happen to be a lawyer.  If I was Matt Lane (of Mamasita) I would be putting in a call to my legal team.  The menu at the new Newmarket, apparently “Southern Californian” is more than “influenced by” Mamasita.  It’s a direct rip-off.  And just like a knock off Louis Vuitton hand-bag at Bangkok’s MBK centre, it’s nowhere near as good.   The menu is a massive hotch-potch of Mexican and Italian and when it came to the table, it was uninspiring.   The old Newmarket had the best food – 2 Hungarian women slaving away in a one-man kitchen whipping up Hungarian favorites like Schnitzel, Creamed Spinach, Goulash, Stroganoff, etc.   I never left there unsatisfied with my meal, and my family and I went many times.   It only took 1 time for me to know I wouldn’t be eating at the new Newmarket again.

3.         The fit-out

A famous American philosopher Francis Fukuyama once wrote that because of the end of the Cold War, there would be no more disputes about the type of ideology people would have (e.g. no argument of communism vs democracy).  So it goes with 6 Degrees and it’s fit out of venues in this great city – design is dead and 6 Degrees have conquered all.  6 Degrees have retained the façade of the old Newmarket and then firebombed everything else.   I walked in to the new Newmarket with a surprising sense of dejavu (being based on my visits to the Royal Saxon, Public House, etc).   The best thing about the Old New Market was that you could go from the dining room to the public bar through the men’s toilet.  If 6 Degrees had any skills they would have appreciated the uniqueness of that and retained it.  Instead they went Hiroshima on the entire place and destroyed it and the next 4 generations after it.

4.         The lack of tits

I’ll never forget walking behind my 2 grandmothers into the old Newmarket for the first time and seeing a topless bartender pulling pints in all her glory.   I think I was about 14 years old.  And then a few years later, I remember being accosted by a stripper in the dining room on a Thursday night when the old Newmarket developed its iconic reputation as “Schnitz and Tits”.  A stripper would walk around the room with an empty beer jug and wouldn’t start her show until she had enough coin in the jug.  Being uni students at the time our donations were usually borderline insulting, but there was always a guarantee – one of my mates would whisper in the stripper’s ear “It’s [insert name’s] birthday” which would result in special treatment.   So many great nights were had there – now, the new Newmarket (no strippers, no topless bartender) – Boring!

5.         No soul

Memo: Julian Gerner – you can’t buy soul.  The one thing that really struck me about the new Newmarket was that it has no soul.  The old Newmarket was run by a guy who looked like he was hanging onto life by a thread.  The bar was his life.  He was there every night – standing next to the bar in the kitchen, making sure the shows went off without a hitch, overlooking the kitchen with one eye and supervising the rabble in the front bar with the other.   There was no “floor staff” – the Hungarian lady in the kitchen frying the Schnitzel was your maitre-de and your waiter, the bartender was your sommelier.  She knew what was in the Goulash because she was the one slaving over it in the kitchen.   My brother and I used to have a sneaky pot of Carlton and play pool after ordering our meals. They were great times.  Whilst the old Newmarket front bar contained an eclectic mix of characters (junkies, prostitutes, drunks, tradeys, etc), the new Newmarket is your standard mix of gentrified urban professionals in their early 30’s.   I just hope that  they told the drunks sitting at a stool in the front bar before they brought in the wrecking ball. 

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