Maggie Scardifield

Summer 2024 update: The cicadas are chirping, the ocean is calling your name and your calendar is chock-a-block. That can only mean one thing: it’s officially silly szn. Whether you’re planning an end-of-year party or a lunch with friends, we’ve rounded up the best spots to wine and dine in Sydney. 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, on-the-ground editors and food writers who eat and drink their way around 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. Happy dining, Sydney. Stay in the loop: sign up for our free Time Out Sydney newsletter for more news, food & drink inspo and activity ideas, straight to your inbox. RECOMMENDED READ: Still hungry? Check out our guide to the best cheap eats in Sydney.

Sydney's Inner Western suburbs have a well-earned reputation as the boho bloc of the city, with arty enclaves in places like Balmain, Marrickville and the rainbow streets of Newtown, where Sydney's counterculture communities still thrive in spite of soaring property prices. And with those creative energies comes a whole plethora of good eats to fuel the community spirits of the Inner West. Workday lunches could be anything from Egyptian street food to dumplings, tamales or banh mi, and when you don't feel like cooking dinner, there's pretty much no corner of the globe or price point not catered to. Want to eat on one of the city's most respected fine diners? Sixpenny is hiding in the residential streets of Stanmore. New world pizza? Hit Bella Brutta in Newtown. Nigerian, Pakistani, or Mexican? Got them all. And if it's the first meal of the day that concerns you, we've got top-tier coffee to spare and avo toast enough to finance a first home owner's grant. If you're hungry in this 'hood, these are the best places to fill your tank. Jump to a section: RESTAURANTS CAFES PUBS 

From Quay’s Snow Egg and Golden Century’s pipis in XO sauce, to Black Star’s strawberry and watermelon cake, Sydney loves to love a cult dish. But what will we be eating again and again in 2019? Toasties, sandwiches and jaffles are making a compelling case for this year’s Most Valuable Player. Likewise, riffs on classic Italian. We go in search of the city’s next round of hall-of-famers. Checked off every item? Work your way through the 50 best bars and the 50 best things to do in Sydney.  RECOMMENDED: The 50 best restaurants in Sydney.

Chef Mat Lindsay wakes up every morning to bake cookies. He doesn’t own a bakery, and the cookies won’t be found on the menu at his restaurant, Ester, in Chippendale, or his Surry Hills wine bar, Poly. They’re for his kebab shop, Shwarmama. The glossy concrete, marble and steel-clad hole-in-the-wall is tucked away on leafy Commonwealth Street in Surry Hills. Lindsay has joined forces with Russell Beard of nearby Paramount House Hotel, Paramount Coffee Project and Reuben Hills fame for the project, and together they make a winning team. The food is fast and fresh, the site considered, the vibe buzzing, and the branding? Pure fire.  Manning the till at the all-day eatery are young staff decked out in Shwarmama merch (think fire-engine red neckerchiefs and backwards hats).  “What’s good?” we ask.  “Literally everything,” says our server. And it’s not a lie.  Go with a gang, and start with the hummus. A well of the silky dip, whipped like cream with tahini, holds juicy whole chickpeas, harissa and citrusy parsley oil. The shawarma is chicken, heavily spiced, and shaved to order from a gas-powered vertical spit. Choose to have it loaded into that crisp-edged laffa, or over chips in the Not Halal Snack Pack. In both guises the juicy meat plays support-act to garlic sauce, harissa, tahini, hummus, onions and hot-pink crunchy pickles, but it’s in the NHSP that you can taste the spices at their best. The chips, too, skin-on and fried extra crisp, somehow hold their crunch under a hot

✍️ Time Out Sydney never writes starred restaurant and bar reviews from hosted experiences – Time Out covers restaurant and bar bills, and anonymously reviews, so that readers can trust our critique. Find out more, here. A booze-friendly, panko-crumbed fried anchovy and mozzarella sanga. Devilled eggs given popcorn-like punch with spiced butter and trout roe. Fiery ’nduja swiped across rye crackers, the heat interrupted by thin rounds of dill-pickled carrot. These are just some of the hits of Café Paci 2.0. And the great news? We’re only at the snacks.  After a three-plus-year wait, Finnish chef Pasi Petänen has swung open the doors to his permanent reboot on King Street in Newtown. With him, he’s brought plenty of imagination and technique, along with stellar booze and an unstoppable team.  The original Café Paci opened in Darlinghurst in 2013. The building was slated to be knocked down, so Petänen was there for a good time, not a long time. Circa 2019, the fine-dining(ish) set menu is gone, and in its place is a wine-bar-ish à la carte offering.  Petänen’s cooking leans a little more Finnish-Italo-Australian than his Mexican-Finnish-Viet riffs of the past, perhaps due in part to his time spent touring That’s Amore pop-ups with Italian wine importer, Rootstock co-founder and sommelier, Giorgio De Maria. The ginger-bearded somm is behind Paci’s cracking new wine list that’s as much fun to read as it is to drink from. If you’re lucky, you’ll find him working the floor, too.  R