Isabelle Webster

Autumn 2024 update: Hey autumn, so glad you’re here, with your still-pleasant weather, fresh air and gorgeous leaves. Sydney’s dining scene is as red-hot as ever, and this guide is the place to start. Here's our list of Time Out's best restaurants in Sydney right now, from hot newcomers to time-honoured institutions, curated by our expert local editors and critics who have tasted their way through Sydney, including Time Out's Food & Drink Editor Avril Treasure.  How did we narrow it down to the very best? When deciding, we considered fun, flavour, creativity, value for money – and 'wow' factor. So yes, of course, you’ll find a fine diner inside the Sydney Opera House here, but you’ll also find neighbourhood pasta, hole-in-the-wall Thai and venues right by the sea. Our picks right now include the hot new diner from the Bentley crew, King Clarence, seafood haven Saint Peter, NY-style steakhouse Clam Bar, fiery Thai joint Pork Fat, and gorgeous trattoria Palazzo Salato. (Be sure to check out our guide to Sydney's best new restaurants, too.) Happy dining, Sydney. RECOMMENDED READS: After a drink? Check out our favourite bars in Sydney. Or: Our list of the best cheap eats.

No two ways about it, Sydney's wine bar scene is flourishing. Full to the brim. Spilling over. A decade ago, there were only a handful of wine bars. Now? They're all over town. And we're here to happily drink them up. What's more, these slick haunts are also some of the best spots in Sydney to grab a nice dinner with friends.  It makes no difference whether you're a novice or an expert, fancy something natural or classic, old world or new, or whether you want to spend moderately or extravagantly, Time Out Sydney's critics, including Food & Drink Editor Avril Treasure, have curated this list for every palate, at every price point. Bottoms up. Can't get enough of that boozy stuff? Check out the absolute best bars in Sydney here.

Autumn 2024 update: The cooler weather may be on its way but that doesn’t mean we’re keen to stay home. Whether you’re heading out on a date, want an after-work tipple, or in for a long session, we’re spoilt for choice when it comes to rocking bars in Sydney. Below, you’ll find the very best ones. This list represents our picks of the best bars in Sydney right now, from fresh faces to tried-and-tested temples of great drinks, ranked by our local editors, critics and fellow booze hounds including Time Out Sydney's Food & Drink Editor Avril Treasure. We’re looking for quality above all, with fun, flavour, atmosphere, creativity and options at every price point. Currently, we're obsessed with Sydney's hot new spot, The Caterpillar Club, debauchery den Pleasure Club, killer sake bar Ante, Darlinghurst's newest bar tinged with nostalgia The Waratah, and PS40 for excellent cocktails. Cheers to you, Sydney. After a watering hole that's a bit more casual? See our list of the best pubs in Sydney, here. After a meal? Check out our best restaurants here.

Some of the best drinking dens in the city are clustered inside the 2010 postcode, which means a sip trip around Surry Hills bars involves a whole lot more excellent cocktails, biodynamic wines and craft brews with a whole lot less trekking between venues. If you like vino adventures, there's ample opportunity to spend max cash on amazing, hard-to-find vintages at the suburb's killer wine bars; there's a rum distillery if you like a sugar cane spirit; and the snack action is nothing to sneeze at when you get hungry and need something to right your sails. Time Out Sydney's critics, including Food & Drink Editor Avril Treasure, have drunk their way around Surry Hills, and below you'll find the very best bars. Want to spread your wings beyond Surry Hills. Here's our list of the best bars throughout in Sydney. Hungry? Check out our guide to the best restaurants in Surry Hills.

A bar crawl in Newtown is the ultimate choose-your-own-adventure for the intrepid thirsty Sydneysider. It's also great if you simply don't like having to take more than a hop, skip and jump between venues. This eclectic Inner West 'burb has more bars than you can poke a cocktail stick at, from lazy beer gardens to rock 'n' roll vinyl joints and everything in between, found all the way down King St and up to Enmore Road. Newtown is one of our favourite boozing destinations, so we’ve rounded up the best places to check out on your next visit, including purple-hued, disco-ball-lit Pleasure Club, killer sake bar Ante, and burgers and beers joint Mary's.  Looking for food? Check out the best restaurants Newtown has to offer, over here. Want more? Check out our guide the coolest bars in Sydney here.

The year 2022 has brought some formidable challenges for hospitality – continued staff shortages, terrible weather, and eye-watering inflation – and yet one brand-new venue bang in the centre of Sydney has seemingly sailed through it all on a sirocco of fresh, complex flavours, fluid architectural curves and unbridled ambition.  Take a bow, Aalia – Time Out’s 2022 Restaurant of the Year.  Aalia (which also wins our award for Best Fine Dining Restaurant) opened in early 2022, the brainchild of the ESCA Group – the folks behind Surry Hills restaurant Nour – after years of planning and research. A sculptural space of light, sandy neutrals, you could call it a visual extension of Harry Seidler’s neighbouring mushroom-shaped building here at the former MLC Centre, now known as 25 Martin Place. It’s an appropriately elegant setting to experience executive chef Paul Farag’s thoughtful menu – ​​a celebration of the history and vibrant cultures of the Middle East and North Africa.  Inspiration for Farag’s menu spans Lebanon to Syria, Egypt to Iraq. In his words, it’s “an Arabian odyssey of dishes showcasing a beautiful region of the world which almost everyone seems to forget has a luscious coastline, flanked by oceans, rivers, and seas…  “In the same way you assume a Mediterranean restaurant is going to be bright and fresh in flavour, this is truly the same principle for Middle Eastern cuisine. The idea is [for] each dish to represent a particular region, or specific era of Arabic cu

Oxford Street’s Paski Vineria Popolare is fabulously versatile. Whether you’re keen to book in and bunker down upstairs at Paski Sopra – “above” – to knock back a couple of wines and every dish on the menu, or to wander in and grab a stool downstairs for an apéro and a nibble on some charcuterie, you’re going to have a gorgeous time.  Paski (which also wins our award for Best Wine Bar) has quickly become a Darlinghurst staple, and it’s easy to see why patrons return to the venue regularly, sometimes even twice in a week. (It’s not just to devour more of part-owner and chef Enrico Tomelleri’s pappalá – the addictive spread made of milk-soaked cod, bread and tomato.) The wines are coordinated by the other two owners, Giorgio Di Maria (Giorgio Di Maria Fun Wines) and Mattia Dicati (Vino Mito), and displayed downstairs on illuminated metal shelves, grouped by producer. The selection runs the length of the building and easily holds 450+ bottles, so you’re sure to find something to fall in love with. The idea was to create two unique spaces on the one floorplan, says Di Maria. Upstairs is “a bit more dining, a bit more service oriented, but still unpretentious. Simple Italian, not too many ingredients, and good pasta”. Downstairs, the vibe is that of a “tight, messy, chaotic wine bar like you’d find in Paris, or Italy”. Come for a wine, stay for a while. Talk to some strangers. Eat some simple, good food. Leave happy. There’s no bookings downstairs, so diners can come and go as the

In the latter half of 2022, another Italian joint joined the Macleay Street strip. But it’s not just more pasta, oh no. From the team behind long-time Potts Point staple, Bistro Rex, Enoteca Ponti is a seriously playful take on all things Italy.  Successfully reinventing the space that was once the sleek, monochromatic home of Monopole, and then, briefly, neon-lit Ria Pizza & Wine, Enoteca Ponti is named for – and inspired by – Mr Gio Ponti, a 20th century Milanese designer and architect. Bright, geometric tiles grab your attention from the street through the large, glass windows, and each oversized gold letter of the name ‘Ponti’ that adorns the exterior wall is in a different typeface – a little preview of the eclectic mix of things to come.  Inside, the fitout, designed by Ar Huis, takes inspiration both from Ponti and from the wine bars of 1950s Rome. The leather banquettes are a deep red. The dark brown wood, copper trims and arched mirrors have a romantic, old-school meets new-school quality. Every detail feels thoughtful, from the blue fabric napkins, to the housemade cannoli shells. It’s a space that’s warm and inviting, so it’s perfect for date night – but with a large group you will be able to tackle more of the mains.  Head chef Aldo Farroni (formerly of Shell House and Ombretta) has put together a menu that's a fusion of regional specialties and flavours. A fairly long list of dishes, from raw to roasted and back again, it covers a lot of ground and will require r

A slender, loud, dimly lit room perfect for a pre-dinner tipple, this Surry Hills wine bar andbottle shop has gently shapeshifted over the years, but the general concept has alwaysremained the same. Snacks to share and excellent wines. Always a winning combination.When Bodega closed in 2019, it wasn’t for long. In fact, they just kind of shifted sideways into WyNo (tucked just around the corner) and renamed the space – WyNo X Bodega – to reflect the merging of the two venues. So, if you have a booking at sister restaurants Porteño or Bastardo, or tickets to see a play at Belvoir Street Theatre, you can grab a glass of wine and the infamous ‘fish fingers’ – garlic rubbed toast soldiers topped with kingfish sashimi and cuttlefish ceviche to kick off your evening.Because of the shape of the space, the original layout from the 121BC days remains. If itain’t broke, don’t fix it, as they say. The long communal table is also the bar, seats up to 27,and fits any configuration of guests; although it feels a little squashy until our neighboursdepart for their dinner booking. The decor is a bit cluttered–although it turns out that theapparently random jumble of framed images are actually made up of the old Bodega mural(“barriga llena corazón contento” – full belly, happy heart) which is symbolic of the re-workingand legacy of the old tapas restaurant, and nice in theory but in practice feels kind ofoverwhelming in such a small space.To the left of the table is Sydney’s skinniest bottle

Opened in 2018, Poly is tucked into the bottom corner of the Paramount Building in SurryHills, a wine bar sibling to Mat Lindsay’s iconic Chippendale restaurant, Ester. While theunderlying vibe is similar (woodfired oven, arches, elegant neutrals with a few pops ofcolour), where Ester is light and airy, Poly is sexy and cool. Semi-subterranean due to the slope of the block, with a vermiculite ceiling (for the purposes of sound-proofing as well as aesthetics) it feels like you’re in a very fancy parking garage. A combination of small, individual tables and communal-style long tables and an even longer bar can accommodate all configurations of guests, from solo diners through to large groups. But it doesn’t feel like you’re intruding on your neighbours, the staff, while incrediblyaccommodating, aren’t trying to squish you in like sardines. The beautiful, brightly labelledbottles of natural wine that line the walls are a focal point, and we could sit and stare at them all day.If you want a snack, the infamous brick of fried hash potato with salted egg yolk and chivesis hard to go past (there’s always room for potato, after all), and, of course, oysters–naturalor “Paramount”; roasted with spinach and garlic–are the perfect mouthful. Add a deftly mademartini or a splash of something from sommelier (and part owner) Julien Dromgool’s conciselist of wines by the glass. Food wise, almost everything is a little on the heavy side, featuringthe smokey, fermented and umami flavours Linsda

Picture this: you’re tearing apart a hot-from-the-oven croissant. You’re covered in an explosion of buttery pastry flakes, and everything is pastel. It's a Wes Anderson/Sofia Coppola/Carrie Bradshaw-in-her-Paris-era fever dream. Also, the croissant is stuffed with almond frangipane and poached pear. Is this heaven? No, you’re in Surry Hills. This is Lode.Inside this millennial-pink accented cave of wonders (designed by Larissa Leigh Interiors)there are nine products to choose from. That might sound like a small selection but whenyou’re facing down some of the most perfect looking pastry work this side of France, it canbe completely paralysing. Is it ridiculous to get one of each? Probably, and the sheeramount of butter might leave you comatose, but there are worse ways to go. It might just be best to get some for now and some for later, if only to strike envy into those who spy you carrying the domed takeaway container (also millennial pink).After a successful patisserie collab with Surry Hills restaurant Arthur and a pastry pop-upthrough LuMi during the 2021 lockdown, and the popularity of the Pithivier (a welcome butsomewhat unexpected course in the Italian x Japanese fusion degustation menu at LuMi) Federico Zanellato (Ormeggio, LuMi, Restaurant LeO, ELE) and LuMi sous chef Lorenzo Librino’s bakery opened in November of 2021 to immediate success. Zanellato and Librino claim they were caught unawares by the instant popularity of Lode, watching the 700 or so painstakingly ma

If you walked straight past Ante on the first attempt, you probably wouldn't be the only one. Double back and look for an understated, chic façade. The words SAKE & SOUNDS adorn the glass in gold lettering and while that’s the general premise, there’s plenty more to discover behind the door. Inside, there’s a low, L-shaped blackbutt timber bar to the left and small high-top tables along the wall to the right. Bar stools are not always the most forgiving for long-haul dining or sensitive behinds, but here, they are wide and comfortable. Good news, in other words, for when “just a quick drink and a snack” accidentally becomes many gin and shiso cocktails and multiple servings of kare pan. And that’s a highly likely scenario at Ante. It should be noted that bookings aren’t taken, so we recommend making the most of getting a seat. While the slogan is ‘Sake & Sounds’ it’ll be the latter you notice first. The rumble of chatter is accompanied by a Jazu kissa inspired soundtrack of vinyl-only beats selected from co-owner Matt Young’s personal collection — 2,500 or so records strong. The custom built shelves at Ante house merely a fraction of this, a mix of jazz, soul, funk and disco. It’s really good music to eat to. The records spin on a 2 Technics 1200 with a handmade Condesa mixer from Adelaide which takes 4-6 months to assemble (nothing but the best, a theme here). The desire was great sound quality, and they’ve achieved it. You don’t have to shout at your date and you can hear t