When did Brisbane get this good?

That was the question Broadsheet writer Elliot Baker asked in a February feature. Like the Brown Snake itself, Brisbane’s standing has always had its ebbs and flows. It lost its shine in the 2000s and early-2010s, but then it slowly began to claw its way back with the birth of new precincts like James Street, Fish Lane and Howard Smith Wharves.

This year – in part thanks to the venue openings below – the trend has become undeniable. Brisbane is building towards a future that’ll hopefully put its local hospitality scene on the same footing as Sydney and Melbourne by the time the 2032 Olympics rolls round.

With so much investment in the local scene, venue owners have been galvanised, seemingly given permission to take big swings and open restaurants that stand out rather than follow a trend.

This year’s best new restaurant openings include taco joints, Italian bars, Cantonese diners, high-end Levantine spots and plenty of neighbourhood bistros.

Here are the best new Brisbane restaurants of 2025.

The Fifty Six, CBD

The Fifty Six caps off Dap & Co’s transformation of the heritage-listed Naldham House. It’s everything you want from a new restaurant opening. The chic fit-out comes courtesy of designer Anna Spiro, who has made it the sort of warm and inviting space that invites you to linger.

The biggest trump card The Fifty Six has is Singapore-born chef Gerald Ong. His resume includes Chairman & Yip, the Canberra outpost of Hong Kong’s Chairman restaurant, as well as Sydney restaurants Porteño and Automata. He’s created a menu of vibrant, punchy Cantonese cuisine.

Alongside Stan’s and Central, The Fifty Six has proved Brisbane has an insatiable appetite for Cantonese Hong Kong-inspired venues. Ong says it’s a natural fit, with Queensland and Hong Kong sharing similar climates. He approaches Cantonese cuisine the same way he would French cuisine, with a focus on the quality of ingredients; balanced, harmonious dishes; and elegance. The menu includes prawn toast, crispy lemon chicken, sticky cumin lamb ribs, Queensland lobster pao fan, dim sum, roast duck and more.

Golden Avenue, Brisbane CBD

Golden Avenue, the latest venue from the Anyday Group, opened in August in the group’s customary sleek, seamless style. Anyday Group co-founder Ben Williamson says it helped that the opening had been more than three years in the making. “It’s enabled us to really get it right and make sure the pieces are perfect,” he says. Designer JAR Office was tasked with creating a Queensland version of Babylon. The result is a sprawling 500-square-metre space packed with greenery, pink juparana granite, green-tinged concrete and stainless-steel finishes. Looks aside, the real magnet for punters is Golden Avenue’s menu of Levantine dishes (not to mention the 150-bottle wine list, Middle Eastern-inspired cocktails and standalone bar). Williamson collaborated with group executive chef Adam Wolfers and head chef Tim Yates (ex-Scully, London) on a selection spanning breads and dips, cold and hot meze, plus large plates courtesy of the oven and grill.

Standout dishes include a spot-on hummus (that took four weeks of tweaking before Williamson was satisfied), which can be topped with harissa lamb or chermoula cuttlefish; a fried quail dish with Levantine chili oil, which nods to the Bekka wings Williamson served when he was head chef at Gerard’s; Mechoui lamb shoulder with fermented daikon; and Lebanese mochi, which is chewy, sweet and finished with fennel pollen and salt. 

Birria Boy, Woolloongabba

Birria Boy isn’t the only Mexican restaurant in Brisbane – obviously. It isn’t even the only Mexican spot on this list, but it is doing something that few Brissie taco joints have attempted: goat birria.

In the old Clarence site, the C’est Bon team, led by chef Andy Ashby, is taking whole goats from Meredith Dairy, slow-cooking them for 15 hours, and making a consommé from the cooking liquid. The meat is then crisped and served inside house-made yellow masa cornflour tortillas with green pico de gallo, goat’s cheese and tomatillo.

Ashby has put in the work, extensively researching Mexican cuisine, consulting chefs like Rebeca Flores of the now-closed La Patrona, eating his way through taquerias, and working with Mexican food supplier Poblano to source authentic ingredients. The menu includes three birria variants: slow-cooked Wagyu beef cheek; braised mushroom with Oaxacan cheese; and the goat birria. Other tacos include confit duck with frijoles, burnt orange and radish, and tempura prawn with tomatillo.

It’s billed as a pop-up, but we’re hoping it sticks around for good.

Bar Monte, Newstead

Bar Monte was tried and tested. The Brisbane outpost of the Miami venue (from the team behind Pixie) brought its brand of Gold Coast and Byron cool to Newstead in September. It’s a restaurant that sits comfortably in contradictions. Bar Monte is chic and mature. It’s all maroon, terrazzo and tiling. Then there’s the grattachecca machine for shaving ice. Sitting smack bang in the middle of the bar, it’s painted bright blue and dotted with metal penguins and fish. It’s that marriage of playfulness and old-school hospitality that has made the team so successful.

The team picked the most “bulletproof” items from Pixie and Bar Monte Miami to transplant to the Newstead menu, so expect Italian classics and snacky plates. Smaller options include a mortadella bun with pickled green chilli and limoncello aioli; anchovy toast with smoked tomato butter; and gnocco fritto served with prosciutto and taleggio. A selection of cold-cuts is sliced to order. Pasta dishes are deliberately simple and risotto will change with the seasons. Mains include an eggplant cotoletta with peperonata sugo; market fish with Jerusalem artichoke and gremolata; and a steak rubbed with porcini and served with onion and marrow butter.

Clarence, South Brisbane

Looking for Ben McShane and Matt Kuhnemann? Check the fields. Most weeks, the chefs and co-owners are pounding the turf with farmer Matt Bakker of Neighbourhood Farm, picking the best produce to harvest and serve at Clarence. It’s this connection to local farms and suppliers – including Sunnybank Fish Market, Falls Farm and Echo Valley Farm – that’s set Clarence apart since it opened in Woolloongabba in 2022. While plenty of venues talk about being “produce-driven”, few walk the walk like Clarence.

And now, after relocating to a sleek 40-seater on Fish Lane, McShane and Kuhnemann have the space to take things up a notch. The new dining room feels grown-up without being stuffy. An open kitchen wrapped with counter seating takes centrestage, while light-green banquettes run along the walls. High ceilings and wide glass windows flood the space with natural light, making it just as appealing during the day as it is at night.

Cartel Del Taco, New Farm

When you consider the popularity of the Hawthorne original, it’s easy to understand just how quickly Cartel Del Taco’s New Farm location found its crowd. (On their opening night, co-owners Marco Ramirez and Erick Martinez said they expected more than 4000 guests to roll through.) Fan-favourite dishes – like al pastor tacos, octopus tostadas and beef birria – have made the journey from Hawthorne.

There’s also a seafood bar and a parrilla grill, which have given chef Martinez more creative freedom. New dishes include a carne asado taco (grilled marinated rib fillet, melted cheese, salsa molcajeteada, onion and coriander on a corn taco); a seafood tower with kingfish, scallops and prawns; and a 1.2-kilogram tomahawk steak served with smoked chimichurri. The atmosphere is buzzy and feels akin to Mexico City, where Ramirez and Martinez are from. The pair flew back home to source furniture and equipment for the restaurant.

Layla, West End

Like Andrew McConnell with Supernormal, Martin Boetz with Short Grain and the teams behind Sokyo, Otto, Lune and Baker D. Chirico, Melbourne restaurateur Shane Delia has his sights set on Queensland.

As interstate chefs and groups look to strategically lay claim to the Sunshine State ahead of 2032, Delia opened his first interstate restaurant, Layla, in late March. Inside a heritage-listed section of the Thomas Dixon Centre, Laya is a spice-driven diner with a moody Studio Y interior.

The menu is classic Delia, but with a tropical twist. Expect small plates like king crab dressed in coriander and lime with charred pineapple; grilled bazlama bread in a sesame-forward umami butter; arak-cured kingfish. Large proteins include habibi butter chicken with ras-el-hanout and a butter chicken-inspired gravy, Westholme Wagyu sirloin, and coal-grilled swordfish. The dessert menu features a whipped knafeh with pine nut ice-cream, and a rich cardamom chocolate fondant cake served with pandan ice-cream.

Marlowe, South Brisbane

Marlowe is one of our favourite new restaurant openings of 2025 – but it would feel just as well-placed on a round-up of superb restaurants in 1965. That’s deliberate.

Thanks to a fit-out by JAR Office, stepping into Marlowe feels like stepping back in time – and into someone’s home. It’s warm, inviting and a little eclectic. It’s housed in a block of flats from 1938. In the same way the fit-out embraces the heritage charm of the space, the menu at the new Fanda Group (Southside, Central, Rick Shores and Norté) restaurant feels equally old-school. Head chef Ollie Hansford hit the books (Ross Dobson’s The Lost Recipes, for example) and created a menu that draws inspiration from ’50s and ’60s dining.

To start, there are snacks like cheddar scones with chicken pâté, curried crab brioche and prawn cocktail tartlets. Starters include smoked cheese soufflé, and a clam and saffron risotto. Mains make use of a woodfired hearth turning out dishes such as a spiced pork chop with caramelised apple; stuffed chicken breast with mushrooms and sherry sauce; and a coral trout Wellington. Signature dishes include a duck pie with jus and radicchio jam; a cheesy garlic bread made with Lune croissant dough; and The Marlowe Mixed Grill, which includes Wagyu sirloin, lamb cutlets, beef tongue skewer and Cumberland pork sausage. On the drinks front, group beverage director Peter Marchant has put together a wine list that’s entirely Australian, save for the champagne, which is French, naturally. 

Winnifred’s, Fortitude Valley

Some venues are in a category all of their own. Winnifred’s is one of them. The champagne-dedicated venue made waves with its 14,000 bottle-strong champagne list, but it also boasts a 60-seat bistro. The restaurant is led by Brittany-born Antoine Potier, who previously worked at Restaurant Dan Arnold and E’cco Bistro. Potier is serving classic French fare like scallops Saint-Jaques, steak tartare, market fish with beurre blanc and steak frites. Desserts have included vacherin, a typically French dessert, which walks the line between a pavlova and an ice-cream cake.

Kiku, East Brisbane

Couple and co-owners Anzu Tanaka and Yuma Iwami have run a market stall under the name Kiku since 2023, but this East Brisbane venue is their first permanent venture. The pair are serving dishes from regions where they once resided – Osaka, Kyoto and Shizuoka – as well as a clutch of nigiri, sashimi and sushi. Standouts include a charcoal-grilled chicken curry and the yakitori. The menu of homely, regional dishes made with love is exactly the sort of fare you might find in a quiet Japanese backstreet. It’s a true neighbourhood gem and quite different from anything else we’ve seen in Brisbane lately.

Reporting by Elliot Baker, Kit Kriewaldt and Becca Wang.

The Best of 2025 is proudly presented by Square, Kia, NAB and Four Pillars. The restaurants in this article were selected independently by Broadsheet's editors.