Homer Rogue Taverna Transports the Grit and Charm of Athens to Cronulla

It’s undeniable that Greek food has hit its stride Down Under. Venues of all sorts are opening – here and in Melbourne – and we can’t get enough. Sydneysiders queue consistently for Timothy Cassimatis’s charcoaled plates at Olympic Meats, it’s still tricky to nab a table at Olympus, and a Cypriot Greek canteen outgrew its little kitchen in its first six months. Homer Rogue Taverna officially opens in Cronulla today, and Sydney’s champing at the bit – they’ve already landed over 1000 bookings.

“I’m getting texts left, right and centre now that people have heard that we’ve been open,” Harry Kapoulas, who co-owns Homer and longstanding Cronulla cafe Ham with his brother Mario Kapoulas, tells Broadsheet. While they welcome the buzz, they’re leaving space for walk-ins – luckily.

When Broadsheet visited on the first soft service, lunch was studded with curious locals poking their heads around the door. And that’s exactly the vibe the Kapoulas duo is after: drop in, eat, drink, come back again.

The 100-seater’s fit-out is far from polished: imperfections mark the naked concrete walls under a rough-sprayed ceiling, and builders’ pencil notes are scribbled on the wall. Harry’s graffitied “HOMER” to one side, there’s a map of Greece Blu-Tacked to the fridge and family photos collage one corner.

“We’ve kept it as raw as we can – we didn’t want to do the stereotypical thing,” Harry says. “Nothing that my mum and dad would’ve opened 20 years ago. And we also didn’t want to do the Greek-island thing, it’s been done a million times, everyone knows it. We love Athens and we love the food there, so we wanted to bring that to Cronulla – Athenian, but give it a twist.”

The small team – including head chef Kirri Mouat, who joins from the Ham kitchen – spent 10 days last summer eating around tavernas, koutoukia and gastrokafenio in Athens, picking up reference points from places like the flame-powered Manari Taverna, the little boozy pastry stop Akra and snacky, casual wine bar Epta Matyres.

Despite the creative licence, Homer’s food is light, super shareable (five to six dishes between two) and unmistakably Greek. Pick from a trio of flatbreads (topped with prawn saganaki, loukaniko and haloumi, or a zingy spanakopita-style spinach mix) to start it off, then cop house-fried crisps to drag through taramasalata or spicy, cheesy tirokafteri. Lemony horta arrives with olives and feta, and charred dolmades are soaked in a frothy avgolemono.

“I just love how original [the Athenian venues we visited] were in the genre of Greek food. It was in my head, but I hadn’t seen it before. I think that’s what most surprised me: how they modernised the Greek cuisine but still kept it authentic with the flavours. That was something we were really wary of: we didn’t want to make it modern and lose the Greekness.”

The single-serve bifteki yiros – a juicy beef patty sandwiched in a mini woodfired flatbread – arrives with the Athens special: a pickle and Big Mac sauce. Spanakorizo is baked and topped with blue-eyed trevally; while manouri, a ricotta-style sheep and cow’s milk cheese, is baked then joined by kataifi and hot honey. The rotisserie wins with chicken souvla, and a capsicum stuffed with herbed-up cheese that’s baked in a flavour-packed saganaki.

The bar runs along one side of the room, and you’re welcome to stand up at the large wine fridge, where prices are scrawled bottle shop-style. The list is currently a 50-50 split of Australian and Greek, but that’ll change quickly if the soft weekend is anything to go by – 70 per cent of wine ordered was from the Greek-only aspro (white) and kokkino (red) lists.

“We’re super rough around the edges,” Harry says. “But just friendly – just real.”

Homer Rogue Taverna
3/3 Surf Road, Cronulla

Hours:
Tue to Thu 5pm–late
Fri to Sun 11.30am–late

homerroguetaverna.com.au
@homer.cronulla