The Original Saint Peter Hooked the World – Can the Sequel Reel It In?

New York has Gramercy Tavern; London The Ledbury. These restaurants are synonymous with the cities that produced them. Sydney has been my home for 35 years, and I’m obsessed with the idea of the Sydney restaurant. And I don’t believe it gets more “Sydney” than Saint Peter in Paddington.

Like Cate Blanchett and The Wiggles, Josh and Julie Niland’s world-famous fish eatery is ours. And how could it not be? We’re so close to the water, the fish are all but leaping onto Saint Peter’s plates. The city takes seafood so seriously it’s just dropped $750 million on a new fish market , our most significant harbourside building since the Opera House.

And while the Nilands are perhaps giving Saint Peter a home big enough for its ambitions when it moves to the Grand National Hotel next month, there’s no doubt part of the OG’s allure is how bloody small it is. I do wonder if some of that magic will be lost. I’m still hooked on the idea that a marble counter with 22 seats and a really good idea is all you need for a truly singular dining experience.

How this tiny spot carries the immense weight of the Nilands’ accolades – the James Beard Awards , the World’s 50 Best Restaurants nods and more – is beyond me.

And the petite Paddo restaurant has never felt more cutting-edge. When I visited on a recent Sunday, there was the remarkable charcuterie Gilda – one of the restaurant’s best scale-to-tail exemplars – threading swordfish-belly bacon, rock flathead mortadella and pickles. There were crumpets crowned with yellowfin tuna tartare that had been dry-aged for 12 days. And then there was my favourite: a corona of King George whiting fillets bathing in olive brine and served with bread, butter, instructions ("rip, dip, butter, fish") and a glass of good chenin blanc.

But most astonishingly, there was Josh Niland. Days earlier, the chef had been in Las Vegas for the World’s 50 Best Restaurants awards. And yet there he was, in the kitchen for the lunch service, quietly frying chips. Apparently Niland found out he’d won his third James Beard Award on the pass that day. But you’d never have known it. Clearly it wasn't the biggest thing on his proverbial plate. The actual plate in front of him was – and always has been – the thing.

Saint Peter at the Grand National Hotel opens on Tuesday August 6.