Ask Matt Moran "what's new?" at your peril. After a 10-week closure and multi-million dollar, top-to-bottom rethink at his 17-year-old harbourside flagship, Aria, about the only things that aren't new are the address and the view.

Aria now has a bigger, brighter, better-functioning kitchen; a mellower, moodier bar fitted out with graceful, padded Grant Featherston chairs; and a lusher, lovelier dining room that mixes travertines, bronzes, woods, soft-leather walls and eye-catching timber ceilings, with art from leading Indigenous artist Christian Thompson.

It's warmer, cosier, more enveloping; less of an observation deck with tables, and more of a luxurious dining room in its own right. Kudos to architect/designer George Livissianis and Moran's partners Anna Solomon and Bruce Solomon.

There's also a new head chef (former sous chef Jason Staudt), new crockery and glassware and an all-new two-, three- or four-course menu out to prove that fine dining has a rightful place in the gastronomic firmament.

But on with the show. The first little bowl of torched and dried tomatoes with bloody mary sorbet, garlic flowers and fermented caper leaves is all sweetness and acidity, while a rich, lush partridge and duck foie gras terrine en croute is faultless – even the hot water pastry is a marvel.

A hand-shaped bowl of picked mud crab, kombucha jelly and fresh Alba white truffle is promising, but there's a rogue element in there that diminishes the others (the kombucha?).

Then curtains up, lights down: out shimmies a whole, small, lightly cooked champagne lobster tail from Queensland, belly-down on a surfboard of soft brioche sponge, touched with a finger lime beurre blanc and topped with an ant trail of excellent Sterling caviar. The sweet prawn-like taste of this FNQ lobster is enough on its own to make it a star. Enveloped in luxurious ingredients, it's a total diva.

Fish has always been a highlight of Aria, and a fillet of bass grouper with samphire and pickled yellow cucumber on a pool of smoked vichyssoise and green zucchini puree is quietly sophisticated.

Moran is proudest, however, of the Moran family lamb; in this instance, a long finger of pink, pan-roasted loin on a tangle of deeply flavoured braised meat, alongside a button of labna, and some pickled grilled cucumber. So much lamby flavour – it's like a woolly wagyu.

You get a lot on the side, from appetisers to bread and kombu butter; to bowls of richly buttery potato puree (that used to sell for $15) and leafy, well-dressed salad; to pre-desserts of lemongrass "paddle pops" and stunning little choux pastry petits fours that are like crunchy asteroids.

Intermissions are well-paced, and staff – some old, some new – are smooth, interactive and well-drilled. New head sommelier Alex Kirkwood has updated the award-winning wine list. It's a pleasure to use, and a delight to find on it the ravishingly rounded 2015 Sorrenberg gamay from Beechworth ($90). Desserts are either pleasant (mango fence around white crumbly bits), or joyful (a tingly ball of watermelon parfait, watermelon sorbet, and strawberry foam topped with dried strawberry dust and bottomed with crushed pomegranate, strawberries and lychees).

Aria has always pulled the big night out crowd before or after a show, but now, with more fire in its belly and ambition in its throat, I'm thinking – it is the show. Bravo.

THE LOWDOWN
Best bit: You get loads of little extras.
Worst bit: All diners seem to care about is the view.

Terry Durack is chief restaurant critic for The Sydney Morning Herald and senior reviewer for the Good Food Guide. This rating is based on the Good Food Guide scoring system.