We hope you're hungry, because the Port Phillip Mussel and Jazz Festival is back after a two-year hiatus for a celebration of music and molluscs. On March 11 and 12, South Melbourne Market will come alive as market restaurants like Claypots Evening Star, Simply Spanish, Bambu, Claw and Tail, Mike's Mussels and Gem Pier Seafood shell out (see what we did there?) plenty of seafood dishes featuring mussels.
Cecil Street will be closed to traffic, and there will also be free cooking demonstrations, workshops, roving performers, giveaways and fun activities for the kids. And the festival is once again teaming up with the Nature Conservatory and supporting the 'Shuck Don't Chuck' campaign. Festival-goers are encouraged to dispose of their mussel shells in special bins so that they can be turned into habitats for baby mussels and oysters to grow on.
On the music front, catch the Sugarfoot Ramblers, Steve Sedergreen, the Shuffle Club, Margie Lou Dyer and Jolene Moran on Saturday (with a special guest appearance by Elvis!). Sunday's line-up includes the Bluetone Assembly, Hoodoo Mayhem, the Dan Felix Express, the Swinging Cat's Pyjamas and the Jackson Combo.
Not a mussel fan? The market's normal restaurants and stalls will be open, so you can have French pastries, German street food, porchetta rolls, boreks, cannoli and more.
Entry to the festival is free, for more information head to the website.
