Visit this flavour-punching Thai-ish diner and see why Joe Kitsana might be the hardest-working man in Sydney hospitality. The Hanoi-style spring rolls and dumplings swimming in chilli, ginger and soy sauce are both must-orders.
A bar and bottle shop styled after the enotecas of Italy. And a colourful upstairs restaurant with pasta and panache. Paski is a three-part stunner by wine importers Giorgio de Maria and Mattia Dicati, and chef Enrico Tomelleri.
You can always count on fresh oysters, complimentary bread and a razor-sharp wine program at this exemplary neighbourhood diner. Come for an Italianate menu, served in one of the inner-city’s most romantic dining rooms.
Tiny Takam serves one of the city’s most ambitious Filipino menus, incorporating native Australian ingredients into traditional recipes. The lemongrass chicken inasal – cooked over coals on the hibachi – is a must order.
This 80-seat spot serves all the Fabbrica favourites, from spaghetti cacio e pepe to cotoletta alla Milanese served with the bone. As ever, the wine list goes big on Italian and Australian drops from the minimal-intervention realm.
The elegant sequel to Sydney's legendary Hunanese restaurant. The signature smoked pork – a dish that counts Neil Perry and Matt Moran among its fans – is on the menu here.
This tiny two-storey diner punches above its weight with a former Sokyo chef in the kitchen and a top mixologist behind the bar. Expect Japanese dishes reimagined with native Australian ingredients, fruity highballs and a warm neighbourhood vibe.
The chef behind this Japanese bistro honed his craft at a Michelin-starred Kyoto restaurant. Here he’s serving top-grade sushi, Kyoto-style duck and classic Japanese dishes that draw everyone from diplomats to Darlinghurst locals.
The Milano-inspired joint emphasises good times and communal eats, serving up pizzas, house-made pasta, and an Italian-leaning wine and cocktail list. Go for its white-base mushroom pizza with truffles or the crowd-favourite vodka pasta.
The club’s signature cacio e pepe is served hot inside a hollowed-out wheel of Pecorino Romano, imported once a month from Sardinia, Italy. That’s how serious this slick diner is about cheese. Score a seat at the communal table with some quality European booze and get down to business.
Sagra is one of Darlo's quiet achievers. It's laidback, it's wallet-friendly, and there's something on the menu for just about everyone. The pastas, most of which come in at under $25 a bowl, are particularly worth your time.
This is the godfather of Italian dining in Sydney. Beppi’s has been ticking-over with the same consistency, fit-out and leather-bound menus – hand-carved by the late Beppi Polese himself – since 1956. Immortal dishes include clams and mussels with garlic, olive oil, white vino and tomato; and zucchini flowers stuffed with ricotta, basil and mushrooms.
Dimitri’s first started as a lo-fi little pizzeria on Crown street; in 2019, it moved up to Oxford Street. The new digs feature an Italian-made woodfire oven, a bigger dining room, plus a dedicated small bar upstairs. The toppings here are a riff on Dimitri’s flavour-over-tradition approach.
Curbside dining, Sopranos-style, since 1965. The buzzy dining room upstairs is a good alternative though, where you’ll find generous bowls of pasta and super-sized schnitzels with cheese and veg. Hair-raisingly robust espresso from 6am until midnight.
At one time, the breakfasts at Bill Granger’s sun-drenched cafe were the yardstick by which all the city’s cafes were measured. This blonde-wood institution still hits with avo on Iggy’s bread, poached eggs with elevated sides and ricotta hotcakes.
The “inner city sando committee” is in session. Come for next-level versions of the classic Japanese konbini snack, plus specialty coffee by a cult Sydney micro roaster.
By day, head to the light-filled cafe for viral hotcakes and dinner for brunch (like meatball pasta). Then, on the right nights, unwind with a glass of vino, share plates and good company (read: house-made tiramisu).
A buzzing cafe doing riffs on Japan’s most famous convenience store item: the katsu sando. The one here is staked with cabbage, pickled carrots, American cheese and more. And considering the size, it’s bang for your buck. Expect katsu salad bowls, smoothies and Single O coffee, too.
This takeaway-focused, old-school sandwich shop makes some of Sydney’s best (and biggest) sangas. But you don’t need to take our word for it – the lengthy queues that form outside it every single weekday at lunchtime should tell you how good these beauties are.
Three Messina chefs have gone all-out with their bakery debut. It’s where French and very nostalgic Aussie influences collide in treats like a Vegemite and avocado scroll, and a fancy take on an old-school custard tart.
Set within a historic former church, this social impact cafe empowers at-risk women through hospitality training and a sense of community. It also collaborates with top Australian chefs to curate monthly specials, events and more.
Enter this extravagant cafe in a corner art deco building – featuring a striking Keeley Baird (from Something More Design) fit-out and a mural by artist Andrew Dennis – for truffles, caviar and a toastie that has to be seen to be believed.
A shop that sells inventive sourdough-brioche doughnuts by a classically trained pastry chef. Traditional flavours are playfully twisted here – there’s a Vegemite-spiked salted butterscotch and another filled with Basque cheesecake.
The successor to Chippendale's Freda's channels the spirit of the original late-night haunt into a buzzing sit-down bar and diner in the heart of Sydney's nightlife district.
Every location of this innovative bakery is different, but this is the most different of them all – it serves dinner. Grab your usual morning pastries, then return for wines by the glass, creative snacks and house-made pastas.
This polished sake room is inspired by a popular Japanese manga – hear the story behind each sake as you sip, and don’t hold back on the nostalgic snacks. We can't get over the Kewpie mayo-shaped chopstick rests.
A compact izakaya like you’d find down a Tokyo alleyway, with hot towels and all. Inside there are more than 20 sakes, plus sake-friendly snacks including yakitori, miso-marinated cream cheese, and scallops in the half shell.
Sydney’s OG wine bar still hits after all these years. Come for a hefty list of mainly lo-fi wines, excellent snacks and sly laneway seating unlike anything else in the city.
There are only a handful of live music venues in Sydney deserving of legendary status. This two-in-one spot below Oxford Street – styled after Andy Warhol’s NYC warehouse in the ’60s – is surely one of them.
A pumping hip-hop nightclub from the team behind Cantina OK. A weekly line-up of DJs spins the best of the genre till super late on Friday and Saturday. This place also has a killer cocktail game, with signature drinks going for a steal before 9pm.
On a sunny Darlo corner, this double-decker pub is all about Australiana, weekly-changing cocktails and reimagined pub classics. The highlight? A showstopping burger by Iceberg's executive chef.
It’s all about “taps, tunes and Chinese” at this legendary 130-year-old pub. Head in for 17 local beers matched with Shandong-style chicken and prawn wontons from a Hong Kong chef. Don't miss the breezy open-air terrace on top.
A 100-year old Sydney pub has been transformed into a handsome three-storey venue featuring an all-day bistro on the ground floor, a 17-room boutique hotel and a sun-soaked rooftop offering views of the city skyline.
Hidden behind a tiny takeaway sandwich shop, this rowdy little tequila bar and taqueria is one of the best spots in Sydney to snag a Margarita. There are more than 15 versions of the classic drink to choose from, plus a neat menu of tacos going for half price on Tuesdays.
After a makeover inspired by New York’s dive bars, this late-night icon is open till 4am seven nights a week. Head in for after-work drinks and topnotch hot dogs, or party till the wee hours to five-hour sets by local and international DJs.
With locations all over the country (and one in Hong Kong), Sydney-born Messina is the definition of a runaway success story. Despite the scale; the flavours, the quality of ingredients and the exacting attention to detail have, if anything, improved over the years. It even uses milk from its own dedicated jersey farm in rural Victoria.
When Rivareno's Darlinghurst location opened, it was the first non-European outpost for this renowned Italian gelati chain. And though it's since spread across Sydney, we think that this one's still the best.
Wall-to-wall books on design make this one of Sydney’s true specialists of the genre. You can find back issues of high-end mags such as Monocle and Creative Review, but that’s not all – there’s also a raft of merchandise for sale by witty design crew, Good Fucking Design Advice.
This colourful store sits on the CBD end of Oxford street, with enough variety to give designers, artists and literary types plenty of inspiration (or procrastination).
