10 best Australian restaurants worth travelling for
Our pick of leading new eateries around the country are the names to know when travelling domestically this season. While wildly disparate, they share a polished sensibility and a buzzy ambience.
The Australian dining scene has been flourishing in the past year. One high point was fish maestro Josh Nilandrelocating Saint Peter to a ravishing new location at the Grand National Hotel in Sydney. But restaurants everywhere seem to be enjoying new vigour, with plenty more launches to come. Melbourne’s king of statement eating, Chris Lucas, unfolded his billet-doux to France, Maison Bâtard, and has announced plans to bring a sibling to his Grill Americano to the Harbour City later this year. Vue de Monde’s Hugh Allen will open a fine-diner, Yiaga, in Melbourne’s Fitzroy Gardens, while in Adelaide, Restaurant Botanic’s former executive chef, Justin James, will launch his own project, Aptos. Across the Bass Strait, gourmands are eagerly awaiting the arrival of a 10-seater from Analiese Gregory. But while you’re refreshing the reservation apps, these are the restaurants to book and bookmark for future travels.
Maison Batârd, Melbourne
No one does bombastic glamour quite like restaurateur Chris Lucas. In a city that takes great pride in its offbeat energy, its low-key holes-in-the-wall, it takes vision and guts to buck the trend and open something unashamedly dazzling. Lucas has already done it with his earlier venues, Society and Grill Americano, and now his three-storey homage to grand French dining has opened on Bourke Street. The food is outrageously opulent – tartares, lobster, chateaubriand and caviar – and the bow-tied waitstaff are elegance personified. Beyond the main dining room there are two other spaces worth exploring: the al fresco La Terrasse, which is an inviting spot for a post-work cheeseburger and a Martini, and the sultry Le Club, which is open for late-night dining and cocktails until all hours. maisonbatard.com.au
Gibney, Perth
If you order nothing else at Gibney, the charismatic new bar and grill that’s almost within splashing distance of Cottesloe Beach, make it the Gibson. Created by bar director James Gentile, it arrives on a silver platter alongside a trio of garnishes: two types of pickled onion (one smoked, one charred) and pickled cherry tomatoes. There’s also a tiny bottle of whisky that you can add to your gin and vermouth with an eyedropper. Choose your poisons, combine at will and you have one of the most inventive cocktails you’ll find anywhere. Follow it up with a luxurious spread of shareable grill classics-with-a-west-coast-twist, like pearl meat ceviche with leche de tigre, and a superb Western rock lobster on a bed of vadouvan curried buckwheat. The showpiece dessert is a mountain of strawberries and cream, with its granita element churned tableside in a vintage ice-crusher. gibneycottesloe.com
Supernormal, Brisbane
Restaurateur Andrew McConnell rarely misses. He and his wife and business partner, Jo McGann, are the force behind some of Melbourne’s most admired restaurants, including Cumulus Inc, Gimlet, and, of course, the original Supernormal. His first foray into the Queensland capital isn’t a straight replica of its Melbourne namesake, which is known for its laneway liveliness and its vending machine that shoots out Japanese snacks. The northern outpost, run by former Paper Daisy and Raes on Wategos head chef Jason Barratt, is a touch more grown-up (the polished terrazzo flooring, the hardwood bar), but still packs plenty of that Supernormal shimmer. With the Story Bridge as the backdrop, diners share dishes like petals of mixed raw fish with ponzu dressing, green chilli calamari and the signature New England lobster roll. For an even better view, move your end-of-meal digestif upstairs to sibling venue Bar Miette. brisbane.supernormal.net.au
Olympus, Sydney
It’s not often that a restaurant drops onto the demanding Sydney dining scene fully formed and immediately radiates with so much energy and enthusiasm that it feels like it’s been there forever. Even rarer is when that eatery is part of one of those great scourges of modern dining, a “precinct”. Somehow ultra-glam Greek restaurant Olympus, at the boisterous new Wunderlich Lane zone in Redfern, pulls it off. The cooking, led by former Baba’s Place and Ester chef Ozge Kalvo, is a big part of it. The taramasalata is one of the tastiest in the city, the dinner plate-sized spanakopita delivers a big, super-greens punch, while the drinks list does a stellar job showcasing local and Greek wines in a way that will intrigue both wine wonks and novices. But at its core, Olympus is about those party-ready Dionysian vibes, and on that front it puts many of its more established contemporaries on notice. olympusdining.com.au
Mínima, Canberra
“Third-culture cooking” is one of the most intriguing dining trends around. It’s a freewheeling amalgamation of the cuisine brought to a new country by migrants, folded into the existing food culture and then filtered through the lens of second and third generations. The result is a joyous hybrid that celebrates the globalisation of food in the best possible way. Hatched by siblings Mork and Benn Ratanakosol, formerly of Thai rulebreaker Morks, Mínima embodies the idea with a fresh, contemporary menu that explores the intricacies of South East Asian cooking in a distinctly Australian way. You might order larb, a Thai salad typically composed of minced meat and a mountain of fresh herbs, and discover it’s reconfigured with eggplant and ricotta. Or perhaps it’s a fish fillet, served with what appears to be a Euro-style brown-butter sauce, before it turns eastwards with the addition of chilli and basil. It’s a smart, heartfelt, and exuberantly creative way to enjoy eating and exploring. eatminima.com.au
LVN at Bird in Hand, Adelaide Hills
LVN may be Australia’s most-exciting winery restaurant. Partly it’s the room itself, filled with an array of contemporary works from artists like Ildiko Kovacs and Georgia Spain, curated by the Bird in Hand’s co-founder Susie Nugent. But mostly it’s the food, dreamed up by former Restaurant Botanic head chef Jacob Davey. Here, Davey achieves a rare feat, using native ingredients in experimental ways without ever losing sight of the most important element of all – deliciousness. On his seven- to 10-course tasting menu you might try a wallaby tart served with local black truffles, or nannygai skewers with pickled fennel and chive butter, and his she-oak-smoked caramels are a curious and clever petit-four. Naturally, all of it pairs seamlessly with the label’s wines. Book the adjoining “O” Quarters accommodation to finish the day with a supper platter of cheese and salumi and another bottle (or two) from the cellar. birdinhand.com.au
Neptune’s Grotto, Sydney
A new opening from the team behind Clam Bar and Pellegrino 2000 is always going to sizzle. In this case, it’s somewhat literal: the interiors of this moody basement Italian restaurant, directly underneath Clam Bar in the centre of the Sydney CBD, feel more than a little Dante’s Inferno, with real candles on the tables and fiery tortoiseshell-print walls. Despite being god of the sea, Neptune himself – depicted in a life-size statue in the centre of the room – seems to emerge from the underworld, rather than from under the waves. But you’re not here for a mythology lesson, you’re here for the food, by the group’s stalwarts, Dan Pepperell and Mikey Clift. It’s northern Italian, so less about the fresh tomato and seafood flavours of the south, and more about rich, meaty ragùs, truffles and carne crudas. Knock it all back with a red-hot Barolo and you’re on fire. neptunesgrotto.com
Oirthir, Bream Creek, Tasmania
Tasmania has a lot in common with Scotland. The whisky. The rivers teeming with trout. All that fresh air and untouched forest that makes you want to pull on a pair of stout hiking boots and a peaked houndstooth cap and go tramping into the wilderness. It took a recently migrated couple with Scottish roots, Bob Piechniczek and Jillian McInnes, to recognise the synergies between the two locations and bring them together on the plate at their restaurant, Oirthir, the name meaning “coast” in Scottish Gaelic. The venue sits on the site of the former Van Bone restaurant and its menu blends Scottish cuisine, such as haggis and neeps, with pristine local ingredients (Tongola goat’s curd, wasabi, Freycinet mussels) brought to life with French cooking techniques. Whisky plays a starring role, featuring in desserts like cranachan, a sort of Scottish trifle layered with honey and oatmeal, and in cocktails using the “water of life” from both local and Scotch distilleries. oirthir.com
Lars Bar and Grill, Gold Coast
There’s been no shortage of steak and seafood joints opening around the country in the past year (including Sydney’s The International and Eleven Barrack). One of the greatest examples is perhaps not where you’d expect it: the Mermaid Beach shopping strip on the Gold Coast. The secret sauce here is chef-owner Lars Kollrepp, who has previously worked as executive chef at some of Brisbane’s most notable eateries, including SK Steak and Oyster, Hellenika and Sushi Room. Kollrepp improvised his own charcoal grill in the kitchen, and he uses it to sear and char proteins to perfection in dishes like pork tomahawks with onion mustard, and scallops roasted in the half-shell with garlic-chive butter. It’s not reinventing the wheel by any measure, but this neighbourhood newcomer is giving a well-worn genre a good glow-up. larsbarandgrill.com.au
Kolkata Cricket Club, Melbourne
Indian fare in Australia can often be reduced to butter chicken and tikka masala on repeat, which is why it’s commendable to see a chef like Mischa Tropp (he’s also behind Fitzroy’s Toddy Shop) drill down into regional and less-explored dishes. Kolkata Cricket Club in Crown Melbourne still has plenty for the curry crowd – and no shade on butter chicken since Tropp’s is legendary – but it’s also a chance to try more intriguing Bengali dishes. Standouts include puchka, a Kolkatan version of pani puri, those delicate cups of pastry filled with tart tamarind water, or goat curry flavoured with the uniquely Bengali taste of mustard seed oil. With palm tree and cricket prints plus rattan furnishings, the setting feels like an old-school, British-Indian gentlemen’s club. And it makes a vibrant addition to Melbourne’s Indian gastronomic scene. kolkatacricketclub.com
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