Where to tantalise your tastebuds

Words: Amanda Hodge Producer: Louise Starkey Picture: Lana Sydney

From splurging on a $55 caviar martini at one of Melbourne’s finest restaurants, to sinking your teeth into traditional paesano tucker such as braised capretto in Perth, here are six of the hottest places to dine nationwide. Picture: Society | Lulu La Delizia

Firedoor in Sydney's inner-city suburb of Surry Hills is about produce, unlocking its true character, and the results are usually sublime: dishes like pipis, garlic and chilli cooked over embers; smoky raw albacore served with celtuce, custard apple and horseradish. Firedoor, NSW Firedoor, NSW

This restaurant is also home to the nation's most exotic and expensive steak, a carnivorous celebration of ridiculously aged beef, fire and smoke.

Tedesca Osteria on the Mornington Peninsula is a restaurant with a mood that reflects travel and wisdom, maturity and life experience. Picture: Tedesca Osteria Tedesca Osteria, VIC Tedesca Osteria, VIC

It is a country place with perfectly executed but uncomplicated food, warmth, style, bonhomie, respect for the produce, intrigue in the wine selection and service behind it. This is probably Australia's most memorable country restaurant. Picture: Tedesca Osteria

The campfire scent reaching your nose upon entering Agnes in Brisbane's Fortitude Valley offers the first hint of the sensory overload you'll experience at this accomplished new venue. Picture: Agnes Agnes, QLD Agnes, QLD

From a list of elegant starters, go straight for the finger foods — smoked oysters, scallop "doughnuts", lamb ribs all hot and fatty, with a zingy lime rub — before moving to heartier dishes: a gorgeously smoky, tender duck; or a bowl of rich, rare tuna with a mackerel vinaigrette. Picture: Agnes

Like a bloom from surrounding gardens, revamped Restaurant Botanic is flourishing from the nurture and artistry of executive chef Justin James. The twee tearoom details are now secondary to features such as porcelain lamps, a "chandelier" of dried flora and a protruding open kitchen. Restaurant Botanic, SA Restaurant Botanic, SA

There are constant delights to be found in dishes such as abalone and asparagus in a paperbark parcel; a skewer of grilled kangaroo and locally foraged morel; and a semi-frozen cream and matching syrup flavoured with the branches of a bunya bunya tree.

Vasse Felix in Wilyabrup, Western Australia, has several elements of a fantastic restaurant — the location is stunning, the dining room is stylish, staff consistently get the service right and the wine is not only good, but fairly priced. Vasse Felix, WA Vasse Felix, WA

Using locally sourced fruit, vegetables, fish and beef wherever possible, chef Brendan Pratt conjures the most extraordinary flavours from his produce to create dishes all his own. Truly one of the country's great vineyard restaurants.

Fico in Tasmania's Hobart is both figuratively and literally a love story: two chefs, two nationalities, two skill-sets, one harmonious result that produces a marriage of highly technical chef skills and Italian flavours and emotion. Picture: Fico Fico, TAS Fico, TAS

Federica and Oskar are great cooks, and their staff out front convey the warmth you expect when a set menu starts at $120. They do marvellous things with local produce such as striped trumpeter, garfish, urchin, excellent pigeon and quail.