City renewal has reworked Sydney’s meals and wine scene, shifting the centre of gravity from the Central Enterprise District (CBD) in direction of the suburbs.
Positive, there are your well-known established eateries with heavenly wine-sipping views of the harbour comparable to Quay with its successful glowing wine listing compiled by head sommelier Steven Pietersma.
However within the posh harbourside Japanese Suburbs and post-industrial Interior West, cooks, hospitality teams and sommeliers have introduced wine-driven bars, bistros and eating places to please the delicate Bacchanalian predilections of locals.
Since sommelier Matthew Swieboda opened Sydney’s ‘unique small wine bar’ Love, Tilly Devine in Darlinghurst in 2010, a flurry of neighbourhood wine dens and nook retailer bistros have arrived on the scene – from Tim Perlstone’s Wine Library in Woollahra to the Coogee Wine Room.
The revolution kicked off in city-nudging Surry Hills with bustling aspect road wine bars popping up in former industrial warehouses between the bricks and barrels.
One other phenomenon is the emergence of the resort as a ingesting and eating vacation spot – together with the revamped Sofitel Sydney Wentworth’s quartet of recent venues with drinks overseen by ex-Rockpool ‘wine man’ Christian Blair.
Greatest Sydney bars and eating places for wine lovers: 10 to attempt
Aalia
25 Martin Place, Sydney
Credit score: Tamara Thiessen
An Arabian and North African cultural journey meets Australian ocean elements by way of uncooked dishes of tuna with finger lime, Moreton Bay bug mezze and mains of blue mackerel with tahini fennel. Aalia – that means ‘exalted’ – opened in 2022 and is about among the many neoclassical facades of Martin Place. The 30-page beverage listing received three goblets on the 2024 Australia’s Wine Checklist of the Yr Awards, and is curated by Tasmanian-born head sommelier Eleonore Wulf, who showcases feminine winemakers and distinctive or regional Australian varieties. France may be very nicely represented among the many uncommon and traditional drops.
Bar Copains
67 Albion St, Surry Hills
Credit score: Tamara Thiessen
Set in a white terraced home with a communal desk, Thonet chairs and petit bistro tables, chef/co-owners Morgan McGlone and Nathan Sasi say the raison d’être of their little bar a vin is to share ‘museum wines’ from their private collections amongst buddies. The ‘cave’ affords some 300 bottles, many by the glass, together with pure wines, conventional drops by small producers with cosmopolitan labels and traditional Australian winemakers – to imbibe with beautiful servings of uncooked diced tuna and rooster liver parfait with sauternes jelly and sourdough.
Bar Julius
The EVE Lodge, 8 Baptist Road, Redfern
Credit score: Tamara Thiessen
A part of the buzzing new Wunderlich Lane precinct, the EVE Lodge’s street-facing bistro has an all-day menu that includes market fish, tomato tarte tatin, zucchini rosti and roast beef bagels – and a 10-page drink listing concocted by Kyle Poole, group sommelier of the wine-savvy Liquid & Larder group, who’s a giant advocate of sustainable winemaking. He favours Burgundies and Italian reds over homegrowns, although Aussie gins reign. Settle right into a banquette and luxuriate in an Archie Rose White Martinez or 4 Pillars Bloody Shiraz Spritz.
Bar Lucia
5 Kellett Road, Potts Level
Credit score: Tamara Thiessen
Among the many fleur-de-lis terraces and fairy-lit branches of Moreton Bay Fig timber, Bar Lucia brings a contact of classical Madrid to Potts Level – with a gorgeously elegant decor of ionic columns within the courtyard, cascading chandeliers and artisan mosaics. The venue was a Wine Checklist of the Yr Awards winner in 2024 within the 50-bottle class, and sommelier Kasia Sobiesiak highlights feminine producers from Orange and the Adelaide Hills to Piedmont and Rioja, downed with tapas or hearty servings of seafood paella and rosemary-infused lamb shank.
Expensive Sainte Éloise
5/29 Orwell Road, Potts Level
Credit score: Tamara Thiessen
Opening on to bird-tweeting Springfield Gardens, this little ‘place for wine and issues to eat’ romantically recollects George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London, the place the author implores the saint to ship simply sufficient cash to purchase bread and a bottle of wine to revive his energy. At this sibling to A Love, Tilly Devine, the five hundred+ varieties on supply ought to do exactly that. Stacked across the cabinets of two darkish and woody parlours are drops from lesser-known Italian and French viticulture areas, plus California and Georgia. The Riesling and Pinot Noir venerating homeowners discover ‘Antipodean types have developed by leaps and bounds,’ borrowing from their Italian counterparts whereas ‘expressing one thing uniquely Australian’.
Kiln
Ace Lodge, Stage 18, 53 Wentworth Avenue, Sydney
Beau Clugston’s signature Australian bush-inspired dish of leeks cooked in paperbark, dabbed with native finger lime CREDIT: Kiln
Creativity, just like the views, hit a excessive be aware on the Ace Lodge’s 18th-floor restaurant Kiln, with ex-Noma chef Beau Clugston on the helm. Fusing Scandinavian simplicity with native bush elements, attempt iconic dishes comparable to Sydney rock oysters with rhubarb and pink pepper and Arnhem land-inspired leeks cooked in paperbark, dabbed with caviar-like native finger lime. Wines and cocktails sport amusing tags – the Courageous New Wine Riot Woman! – a West Australian white mix – is for these looking for a ‘Contact Extra There White’. Or attempt a Witching Hour, mixing Dalmore 12YO with gentian and orgeat.
Monopole
20 Curtin Place, Sydney
Credit score: Tamara Thiessen
Darkish, moody, decked with velvet curtains and classic wine honest posters, Monopole, that means ‘one wine, one winery, one producer’, is run by award-winning duo, chef Brent Savage and sommelier Nick Hildebrandt, co-owners of The Bentley Restaurant Group and its namesake eatery. Monopole is 100% French – ‘traditional with modern aptitude’ – together with the wines, aperitifs and digestifs. Anticipate vol-au-vent full of pasture-raised Sommerlad rooster and Balmain bug and sweetcorn. With 600 wines – 30 by the glass – it received Greatest Wine Checklist NSW in Australia’s Wine Checklist of the Yr Awards in 2024, famous for its ‘quite a few mini-verticals’.
Saint Peter
The Grand Nationwide Lodge, 161 Underwood St, Paddington
Credit score: Saint Peter
When chef Josh Niland moved his well-known fin-to-scale fish restaurant to a brand new Paddington deal with final yr, he dubbed the reimagined Nineties Grand Nationwide Lodge ‘a multi-dimensional hospitality hub’. Amid the modern stone, brass, timber and upholstered banquettes, head sommelier Houston Barakat’s wine listing provides satisfaction of place to a number of ‘hero producers of New South Wales’, ‘established icons’ and ‘new-wave producers’, rotating based on ‘seasonality, availability and deliciousness’. Pair them with fish charcuterie, line-caught John Dory and dry-aged yellowfin tuna from the 11 Course Chef’s Desk Menu.
Tilda
Sofitel Sydney Wentworth, 61-101 Phillip St, Sydney
Credit score: Steven Woodburn
With a giant hook on seasonal ocean-sourced flavours and sustainability, this stylish ‘Australian interpretation of a traditional grill restaurant’ has a 50 web page drinks listing to accompany the charcoal-cooked dishes from the open kitchen. Head sommelier, Guido Pisani ensures visitors get ‘a new-found zest’, as Banjo Paterson’s poem on the opening web page of the drinks listing guarantees. The restaurant’s title is a nod to his well-known unofficial nationwide anthem, Waltzing Matilda. The listing champions Australian producers from Clare Valley Rieslings to Tassie Coal River Pinot Noirs and claims: ‘There’s by no means been a greater time in historical past to be ingesting Australian Wine’ by way of a way of place.
Vermuteria
60 Kings Cross Highway, Potts Level
Credit score: Chris Pearce
Morphing out of an establishment and nonetheless with a Spanish flavour, Vermuteria occupies the bohemian gem the place Cafe Hernandez bar and roaster stood for 50 years till 2022. With a lot of the decor nonetheless in place, together with an enormous replica of Diego Velázquez’s Rely-Duke of Olivares, the charming aperitif bar is filled with memorabilia and vibrant window shows of classic vermouth and sherry bottles behind its pink awning. From the every day vermouth hour at 5pm, the bar serves cocktails and a small however high-quality number of Spanish wines with finger meals comparable to San Sebastian-style pintxos or a wad of Basque cheesecake.
