What happens when a food-loving nutritionist opens a restaurant? Well, at Rosie's Coogee, which has just swung open its doors by the beach, the menu is refined sugar-free, the tonic water organic and naturally sweetened, and the house wine preservative-free.

Owner Shannon Rosie Barge has brought her training as a nutritionist to the party, working with chef Shireen Reilly (ex head chef, Bills) to build healthy food from the ground up.

"Instead of using sugar we're adding pickled elements," says Barge. "People actually want flavour; sweet is just the easy cop-out."

The menu lunges from Japanese cucumber miso salad to lamb fillet with green pea tzatziki, and a cheese plate "with pear and licorice on it to help your liver and signal to your brain to hold onto fluids so you don't get dehydrated".

Barge has also found time to pen a book, Conscious Cocktails, which will be released later this month. Just don't expect to find traditional sugar syrup in the recipes.

Open Wed-Thu 5pm-10pm; Fri-Sun noon-midnight.

31 Alfreda Street, Coogee, 02 9665 6797, rosiescoogee.com.au