South Australia’s Restaurant Botanic named country’s best at national Gourmet Traveller awards

This landmark city restaurant “combines fun and adventure with polish and poise”, and now the foodies at Gourmet Traveller have decided no one in the nation does it better.

A South Australian restaurant that sources inspiration and ingredients from its surrounding gardens has been named the country’s best.

Restaurant Botanic has won the coveted title of Restaurant of the Year in Gourmet Traveller’s 2023 Restaurant Awards. It comes less than two months after The Advertiser awarded the restaurant top spot in the delicious.100.

Chef Justin James, who has cooked in some of the world’s most decorated establishments, including Eleven Madison Park (New York) and Noma (Copenhagen), accepted the award in Sydney overnight.

Restaurant Botanic executive chef Justin James inside the restaurant. Picture: Tom Huntley

Editor of GT Joanna Hunkin said the restaurant, located in the old tearooms at the Adelaide Botanic Garden, “combines fun and adventure with polish and poise”.

“Chef Justin James doesn’t attempt perfection but rather embraces the beauty of irregularity and nature, making the most of the restaurant’s iconic location and using the garden’s bounty to create something uniquely of its place,” she said.

The award adds to what has been a meteoric rise for the restaurant, which reopened after a major transformation little more than a year ago.

The four-hour dining experience, called The Garden Trail, offers a selection of more than 20 “flavour combinations” that morphs constantly depending on what is best and what is in season.

When Restaurant Botanic topped SA’s delicious. 100 list of best restaurants in July, James said developing his dishes could take “up to three months”.

The “picnic” course at Restaurant Botanic, featuring marron, corn and lemon myrtle.

“Someone that paints a picture can take three years. And to me, these (dishes) are little masterpieces … and at Botanic we’re doing over 20 of them,” he said.

Jock Zonfrillo’s restaurant Orana, which closed in 2020, was the last South Australian to claim the Restaurant of the Year title, in GT’s 2018 awards.

South Australian chefs Mug Chen and Chia Wu, of Muni in Willunga, won the Best New Talent award.