Destination NSW boss Steven Cox sure knows how to ruffle some feathers in Victoria. Speaking at The Sydney Morning Herald’s Sydney 2050 Summit last week, Cox said the Harbour City “has the best food and drink and produce of anywhere in Australia”. This is exactly what you would expect a state tourism chief to say, of course, but Cox then supported his claim by quoting former Rockpool chef Neil Perry.

“I said, ‘Neil, you’ve got restaurants in Sydney and Melbourne, where is the best food in Australia?’ He said without a shadow of a doubt it is Sydney,” said Cox, according to Herald Sydney Editor Michael Koziol’s coverage of the event.

Cue much croissant-throwing by my Victorian colleagues. “How could Perry say that! The nerve! There’s no competition. We have caneles. And laneways! And the big seafood dumpling at Flower Drum!”

They’re right. There is no competition. Sydney leaves Melbourne in the dust for dynamic, trailblazing restaurants. And by “Sydney”, I mean all of Sydney – Bondi, Strathfield, Bonnyrigg – not just the CBD, although it should be said that the inner-city is going off. White-hot restaurants are opening at a rate we haven’t seen since the 2000 Olympics.

In the past five weeks, Sydney’s CBD and The Rocks have welcomed sprawling Mediterranean grill Le Foote, swanky trattoria Palazzo Salato and New York-inspired bistro Clam Bar. Melbourne’s most exciting new restaurant this year seems to be a fancy souvlaki shop from one-time MasterChef host George Calombaris.

Melburnians will say that more Italian and American joints do little to advance a city’s unique food culture. Sydney needs more “Sydney-style” restaurants. I say Clam Bar, for one example, is entirely unique. The steakhouse model is lifted from New York, sure, but a Manhattan grill chef would sooner serve oysters with Vegemite than Clam Bar’s choice of Vietnamese dipping sauce and ginger chipolatas.

This is what Sydney restaurants do best. They take the most delicious ingredients and ideas the world has to offer, and they create something thrilling and fresh.

It’s what Sydney restaurants have always done best, though. The line-up of Sydney-based chefs that helped define Modern Australian dining is massive, from Tetsuya Wakuda and his high-end “fusion” cooking, to Jenny Ferguson’s passion for beautiful produce in the late ’70s at You and Me on George Street.

Sydney’s restaurants take the most delicious ideas the world has to offer, and create something thrilling and fresh.  

Then there’s Kylie Kwong, Bill Granger, David Thompson and Serge Dansereau; Janni Kyritsis, Matt Moran and Sean Moran; Christine Manfield, Peter Gilmore and Neil Perry, not to mention Philip Searle and Barry Ross, Peter and Beverley Doyle, Gay and Tony Bilson, and Damien and Jospehine Pignolet. (I’m only stopping here because I have a limited word count.) These giants of the industry have helped shaped the way Australia and, indeed, the world eats today. Can Melbourne claim that?

Importantly, many of those chefs are still firing on all cylinders. Granger’s sunny-side-up cafes continue to create morning queues in 19 restaurants globally, Perry is wood-firing the best selection of home-grown produce in the country at Margaret in Double Bay, and Kwong cooks her take on Australian-Chinese for the local community and workers at her Eveleigh canteen. You can see her influence in a new generation of chefs inspired by their own experiences and cultural background to forge a singular path. I’m thinking of Paul Farag at Aalia, and Ho Jiak’s Junda Khoo.

Meanwhile, Gilmore has continuously held three Good Food Guide hats at Quay for more than two decades – a national record. The fine-diner is one of four three-hat restaurants in Sydney, with Oncore at Crown, Stanmore’s Sixpenny and Surry Hills’ Firedoor also claiming the Guide’s top gong. Melbourne, by contrast, has two three-hatters – Vue de Monde in the CBD, and Richmond’s sushi-focused Minamishima.

Hark! Can I hear a Victorian yelling that “Melbourne has better mid-tier restaurants”? They’ve been saying that ever since Andrew McConnell opened Cumulus Inc in 2008 and introduced Flinders Lane to sardines on house-made toast. Sydney caught up yonks ago, however, and the city and suburbs are rich with one- and two-hat restaurants serving share plates for less than $30. We’re talking Cafe Paci, Ante, Ester, Continental, Ragazzi, Nomad, Lankan Filling Station, Porkfat, Kiln … (again, word count).

Exciting booze is being poured at these “mid-tier” places too. Outside the actual wineries, Sydney was ground zero for Australia’s natural wine surge. Rootstock festival helped create a new generation of invested, progressive drinkers when it launched in 2013, while venues such as Aperitif, Bentley and 121BC informed the natural wine bar template that’s so popular across the country today.

Sydney, arguably, can also claim Australia’s best: pho (An Restaurant, Bankstown commonly held as the country’s best), fish and chips (Charcoal Fish, Rose Bay, run by the famous Josh Niland, need we say more?), Thai (dozens of examples), and char kwai teow (first table on your left at the hawker centre opposite Guildford train station). I’ll concede that Melbourne has better spaghetti.

Melbourne, you’re also better for food shopping, and your pubs are way more fun. Pokies have turned so many of our old boozers into lifeless gaming dens. I still love your big, grey streets, and I’ll always be jealous of Gerald’s Bar, Embla, and yes – that massive mud-crab-stuffed soup dumpling at Flower Drum. But a few choice snacks and world-class dim sum can’t match Sydney’s energy, innovation and all-round deliciousness.

“The winner is Syd-er-ney!”

Callan Boys is the editor of The Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide.