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The Circular Quay location may be smaller and slicker than this institution’s old Hunter Street digs, but Malay Chinese’s warm atmosphere endures. Regulars strategise on how to score a seat, and lean over bowls of laksa made to a recipe that hasn’t changed since patriarch Meng Woon opened the first shop in 1987.

Chilli oil forms a slick on the surface of coconut-milk rich broth, vermicelli have appealing bite and protein choices – chicken drumstick or king prawn, perhaps are generous. Woon is still a fixture, greeting customers, clearing tables, occasionally handing out mandarins.

Sydney has too much great laksa to pick a “best”, but the har mee, built on broth of long-simmered prawn heads and teeming with pork and Hokkien noodles, has few competitors. Don’t sleep on the char kwai teow and Hainan chicken rice, either. (Also in Ashfield.)