A part of our colonial history, the comforting combo of meat, veggies and gravy has made a comeback in pubs and restaurants in the east, as diners turn to hearty nostalgia-tinged fare over the tweezer-set kind.

Like Watts’ mum’s version, we’ve Aussified the roast with lamb and chicken iterations, but plenty of purists are still honouring the beef tradition. It’s hard to beat a homemade version but if you’re keen to skip the washing up, there are plenty in the east offering this warm hug from grandma with all the trimmings.

Solotel co-owner Matt Moran was raised on a steady diet of Sunday roasts with his nan by his side. “To me, a roast is all about being at the family farm or at home with the family, building memories,” the chef and restaurateur tells Wentworth Courier.

For Moran, lamb and chicken still rule the roost. “The essential of a good roast is keeping it simple and using local produce. A Sunday roast at mine is a slow-roasted Moran family lamb shoulder paired with root vegetables pulled from the veggie patch.”

The Moran family lamb is a mainstay at Chiswick Woollahra, and there’s also a rotating Sunday roast each week. Pay $75 a head and settle in for rolled suckling pig with baked sage and onion stuffed apples, followed by treacle tart and clotted cream. Or it might be roast beef, yorkshire pudding, fresh horseradish and roast gravy, with rhubarb crumble and vanilla custard for afters. Duck fat chats, mashed carrots, wilted greens and live jazz tunes are all part of the deal.

Nearby, the Sunday roasts at Paddington’s The Unicorn have been pulling in crowds. Head chef Andrew Corbel mixes up the beasts each week, choosing choice cuts that work best on their charcoal wood grill.

Expect smoky, marbled Rangers Valley wagyu tri-tip, juicy-fleshed Bannockburn chickens or Kurobuta Berkshire pork. “For the trimmings, we just keep to the basics with minted butter peas, roasted whole carrots and dry-aged beef fat roasted spuds,” Corbel says.

These aren’t your regular spuds but the glass-shattering, fluffy-centred kind, perfect in a puddle of rich gravy.

Growing up, Sunday was the best day of the week for the Paddo Inn’s Yorkshire-born head chef, Mark Holland. “Most English households have a similar feel on Sundays – family, food and lots of banter,” Holland says.

“All the family would be invited – we would even get the posh cutlery and glasses out.” He’s recreated the British spreads of his childhood at the Oxford St stalwart for $27 a pop, with tender roast beef, caramelised veggies, and crisp-edged yorkshire puds that are puffy enough to soak up all that gravy, a la his hometown.

Over in Darlinghurst, craft beer tavern the Local Taphouse offers fall-off-the-bone roasts (their meats are slow-cooked overnight), fat, crunchy chats and a couple of ladles worth of gravy for $25. In the name of inclusion, they also do rotating vegan and vegetarian roasts spanning nut roasts to smoked vegies that land with a plant-based gravy.

Its pans may no longer be manned by Colin Fassnidge or Guillaume Brahimi but Paddington’s Four in Hand still does a mean Sunday roast for $25. The meats flit between beef, lamb and pork with a supporting ensemble of yorkshire pudding, roast veggies and traditional gravy. It helps that the wine list is a cut above here, with a strong contingent of Aussie classics and few internationals thrown in.

Waverley locals will be quick to point you in the direction of the Charing Cross Hotel, or the Charo, when the clock strikes Sunday lunch. $29 will nab you a sirloin of roast beef, swede mash, taters, yorkies and gravy. The Sunday roast is available until sold out, which has happened on occasion.

Surry Hills’ Dove and Olive wins in the bang for buck stakes. For $19.90, score a mound of meat, veggies and pud showered in thick gravy.

There’s over 20 beers on tap, five-buck schooners and $8 pints all Sunday long to sweeten the deal.