Sashimi bar unlike any other coming to Bondi (plus two more nearby openings to get excited about)

Add fresh seafood from GetSashimi, Spanish-inspired snacks from Iberica and Easy Tiger’s Balinese-style suckling pig stuffed into bao buns to your beachside hit list this spring.

Scott Bolles

September 18, 2023

Bondi’s rush of incoming spring food start-ups will include a venue its owner claims as a first for city: Sydney’s first dedicated sashimi bar.

The 20-seat counter will display fresh, raw seafood customers can select, which a chef will cut to order. Takeaway sashimi will also be available.

“There’ll be an eight-metre sashimi bar and a train at the back, there hasn’t been anything like this before,” Antonio Muollo says of GetSashimi, which opens at the Pacific Bondi Beach development on Campbell Parade next month.

GetFish is expanding into Bondi.Ari Georgopoulos

The entrepreneurial Muollo has quickly made a name for himself with his GetFish business, offering home-delivered seafood in Sydney and running one of the busiest outlets at the Sydney Fish Market. “Where better than Bondi Beach to open,” he says.

There’s method behind his choice of location. While Sydney is littered with sushi, he eyed a gap for high-quality seafood in its purest sashimi form, drawing on Bondi Beach’s pull as a destination for Sydneysiders looking for an added experience on a beach trip.

There’s also the shift in consumer behaviour. “People want healthier food,” Muollo says. He’s banking on sashimi as the new fish and chips.

On Thursday, October 19, GetSashimi will offer a tuna-cutting show (6-7pm) and free sashimi, before its grand opening the next day.

Easy Tiger’s head chef Andrianto Wirya.House Made Hospitality

You won’t have to wait as long for Bondi’s other spring openings. A few doors along from GetSashimi, Easy Tiger opens on Wednesday, September 20. The latest venue from House Made Hospitality (Grana, Lana and Promenade restaurants), Easy Tiger slides into the space where the Rancho Seltzo pop-up ran over summer.

Head chef Andrianto Wirya has Mr. Wong and Queen Chow on his CV, and South-East Asian cooking in his DNA. Channelling his Indonesian heritage and love of the food of the region, the opening menu at Easy Tiger includes crispy corn larb, beef rendang party pies, wood-roasted cauliflower green curry and Balinese-style suckling pig stuffed into bao buns.

The 70-seat Easy Tiger isn’t the seaside suburb’s only opening this week. Up the hill, near Totti’s in the original site of Panama House, Iberica also swings open its doors on Wednesday, September 20.

Iberica, a tapas wine bar, will narrow its gaze on the cuisine of the Balearic Islands, which sit off the east coast of Spain. Owner Joaquin Saez was born in Chile, but moved to Europe as a teenager, spending long period on the islands. Although best known for Majorca and party island Ibiza, Balearic seafood, bread and cheese have a distinct food identity.

Jamon Iberico, petit bosque and guindillas from Iberica.Emily Abay

Columbian executive chef Ivan Sanchez, a former head chef at Porteno restaurant in Sydney, will offer an opening volley of small dishes such as fried padron peppers, prawn and scallop paella with green salsa, and house-made bread with truffle butter candles.

Head barman Carlo Valdivia pushes the boundaries with a martini with manzanilla sherry, saffron gin, lemon zest and basil oil, and a red sangria.

Saez, who also owns Bondi Greek-focused Mediterranean Ikaria, is hopeful tapas is set to stage a revival in Sydney. After a relatively quiet period following Sydney’s post-Olympics tapas obsession, Saez believes the next-gen of operators are focused on quality over quantity. “It’s a wave of people trying to do it the right way.”