The best restaurants in Manly

Ever tried a Nepalese dumpling? They’re called momos, and you can find some of the best pudgy little pork pockets on the Northern Beaches at Momo Bar Manly. Seems simple, right? Wrong. This little Market Lane kitchen is also doing poke bowls. Yes, the Hawaiian fish salad. Stay with us, because somehow Nepalese-Japanese-Hawaiian-via-the-Northern Beaches works an absolute treat. Locals know it – a small queue snakes out of the shop front and virtually every table is taken up on a Friday lunch time. 

A tray of oysters so fresh and briny they might have been sent back from the future, and a cold tinnie of Magic Rock’s High Wire grapefruit American pale ale is pretty much exactly what you want for supper on a sweaty Sydney evening. And it’s definitely the best way to approach Arthur’s Oysters and Seafood, the sustainable seafood restaurant in Manly by Scottish chef Jason Wright.

Cured is all about simplicity, with a menu that exclusively features cured meats and cheeses. But is it too simple, too pared-back? We ventured north to find out. Positioned in a laneway just off the Corso, it’s a warm, welcoming space. You enter into a long, narrow, bare-bricked room with tight-knit tables, a coffee machine at the back, and a makeshift open kitchen in the corner, featuring little more than a meat slicer and a surface for cutting. Sausages and hams dangle from the ceiling.