All the New Adelaide Restaurant, Cafe and Bar Openings We Got Excited About This Autumn

With autumn behind us, the days are getting shorter and the nights longer. It’s also getting increasingly hard to work up the courage to head outside – but these hot new venues are worth leaving the house for.

Here – in alphabetical order – are 10 new Adelaide venues Broadsheet covered over the last three months.

Bora, Grange

David William brings his Brazilian roots to a coastal setting with Bora. Serving coxinha and Caipirinhas alongside smashed avo and Bloody Marys, Bora is a laid-back daytime spot that eases the transition from morning coffees to afternoon cocktails. The expansive, all-day menu covers brunch staples like brekkie bagels and chili tofu scrambles. Specials – such as bolinha de queijo (crispy cheese balls) and brigadeiros (a chocolate dessert) – nod to William’s heritage.

Canopy Bar, CBD

Canopy Bar reimagines the much-loved Stem space as a laid-back wine bar. Formal dining has been replaced with casual places to perch, plus a DJ spot for Friday and Saturday nights. A vast selection of back vintage and rare wines sits alongside craft cocktails on an approachable drinks menu. Snacks include cheese and charcuterie, kimchi toasties and caviar. Whether you’re stopping in for a wine, or a quick snack and a G&T, the ethos behind Canopy is: “come in and do whatever you want,” says owner Henry Bampton.

Gabagool, Flinders Park

The corner spot with a bold red and white design brings vintage New Jersey-inspired nostalgia to town with capocollo and deli sandwiches. Taking its name from the famed Italian American slang for cured pork neck, Gabagool is all about big, unapologetic American-style subs. The succinct menu features several standouts, including the Philly cheesesteak made with premium-grade Scotch fillet that’s dry-rubbed and hand-sliced every morning. There is also the Italian, a layered sub with mortadella, salami, prosciutto and capocollo; the pork and veal meatball sub with rich vodka sauce; and the brekkie sub with fried eggs, crispy pancetta and provolone.

Mini Lokanta, North Adelaide

Ten-seater Turkish restaurant Mini Lokanta is only open on Saturday nights. It feels like an intimate dinner in someone’s home – which it is. Enver Tuğrul Özbecene and Gökçe Özbecene, who moved to Australia from Turkey four years ago, set up the restaurant in the front room of their heritage-listed home. Their goal was to share the flavours and customs of their homeland. The eight-course menu is a love letter to the slow dining approach of meyhanes (Turkish taverns). As the hours and the glasses of raki slowly disappear, there’s a chance Enver will pick up the baglama and play a tune.

Pinco Italo, CBD

Pinco Italo, is an evolution of Pinco. It’s the same offering but grown-up, with white tablecloths, cocktails and a menu of Italian classics. Expect lighter plates like rockmelon wedged between slices of buffalo mozzarella as well as classic house-made pasta including pappardelle with a white pork and beef ragu and gnocchi cacio e pepe with thinly sliced prosciutto cotto. The lunchtime sandwich menu includes all the Pinco regulars, as well as newer items like fried chicken alla vodka and a spanakopita melt. The warm interior, which contrasts with its brutalist shell, makes Pinco somewhere you’d want to linger, perhaps with a cocktail in hand, taking in the weekly Thursday jazz.

Prospect Hotel & Cellars, Prospect

Prospect Hotel & Cellars is the first pub to have opened on Prospect Road in over 100 years. A former Foodland site, the space now seats 200 people and has concrete floors, deep green walls and long communal tables. Not a typical pub, the venue is more of a brasserie with a wine bar edge.

Septimus House of Wine & Cheese, CBD

Owner Ian Coker has dedicated his life to collecting wine, music and art. At Septimus, he’s sharing his passions with the rest of us. The 50-seat, two-storey bar sits in a historic Grenfell Street shopfront. Cosy and elegant, the space is somewhere you’d want to curl up with a glass of red wine on a winter’s night. Septimus is casual and unpretentious, and so is its menu. With the exception of one gin and one beer, it’s just wine – 10 by-the-glass options and 27 by the bottle – and cheese chosen by Say Cheese’s Valerie Henbest. Wines and cheeses can be ordered individually or as one of seven pairings. A dozen bottles from Coker’s 800-bottle-strong personal collection are on the menu.

Shadow Baking, Glenelg

Shadow Baking began as a market stall in Sydney run by the Messina team. Now it’s a full interstate operation with several Sydney outposts and a new bakery in Glenelg. There are seats for people who want to enjoy their treats and coffee in-store. The menu echoes the Sydney stores with pastries and fresh loaves of focaccia. Shadow is known for its custard tart danish, which is described as “a big slab of Hey La La vanilla custard inside croissant dough”. With one store now open and one more to come, the Shadow team is well and truly stepping into the light.

Super Americano, Frewville

Peter De Marco has been involved in some of Adelaide’s most popular dining spots over the past two decades (Pizza e Mozzarella Bar, Borsa, Chicken & Pig). Earlier this year he opened Super Americano, a casual brunch spot by day and a restaurant by night. It serves up homestyle Italian eats including baccala, Neapolitan-style pizza and – De Marco’s passion project – a four-day proved and woodfired bread. Seasonal dishes and wines are scrawled on chalkboards. Pantry items – think Petra flour, San Marzano tomatoes, anchovies and a curated selection of Italian wines – are available to purchase.

Yuku Do, CBD

Yuku Do offers up a refined take on Japanese convenience food. The goal behind Yuku Do was to create something akin to a Japanese convenience store where quality, not quantity, is king and a three-ingredient sandwich can feel as indulgent as a full tasting menu. The compact menu centres on a tight clutch of sandos, generously packed hand-formed onigiri, and sides of chicken karaage among other things. The drinks list is simple yet refined, with coffee from Melbourne’s Dukes Coffee Roasters and a house-blended matcha that’s layered and surprisingly mellow. Yuku Do may be designed for a fast-paced crowd looking for takeaway service, but its approach is intentionally slow and thoughtful.

Additional reporting by Lucy Bell Bird, Stacey Caruso, Daniela Frangos, Jessica Galletly, Nadia Luksich and Katie Spain.