7 Best Restaurants in Sydney, New South Wales

With windows overlooking the Opera House and Harbour Bridge, Aria could easily rest on the laurels of its location. Instead, celebrated chef Tom Gorringe creates a menu of extraordinary dishes that may be your best meal Down Under. There's inventive seafood dishes, premium meats, and beautifully presented desserts. The dining experience is focused on different four-course tasting menus, with matching wines. And this dining experience doesn't come cheap but fine fare rarely does, especially in Australia. 

One of Australia's most renowned chefs, Peter Gilmore, oversees the kitchen at possibly the most superbly situated dining room in town. Tucked into the side of the Opera House, the restaurant affords views of Sydney Harbour Bridge and the city lights. Gilmore's creations are as special as the view and showcase the best of Australia's produce with a focus on terroir, with dishes like aged Kurobuta pork or Tasmanian southern rock lobster. Whatever you do, leave room for dessert, with the cherry jam lamington, a clever interpretation of the Australian classic cake, which has been a constant on the menu for almost a decade. It's that good. Pretheater dining is available if you are going to a performance in the Opera House but booking is essential.

Quay has been Sydney’s top restaurant for 30 years and it's still going strong with chef Peter Gilmore's experimental Mod Oz cuisine created with seasonal, local produce. The menu has carefully created seafood dishes, like wild blacklip abalone or native freshwater marron or crayfish. But it’s the White Coral dessert, which is what Quay has become known. It's a white chocolate ganache shell filled with feijoa fruit ice cream and coconut cream. Add in the sweeping vista of the Opera House and the sparkling harbor, and it's perhaps no surprise that prebooking is essential.

A meal at Rockpool is a crash course in what Mod Oz cooking is all about, conducted in a glamorous, long dining room with a catwalk-like ramp. Thai, Chinese, Mediterranean, and Middle Eastern influences can be found in the dishes here. The menu is extensive, with caviar from around the world to start. The Wagyu beef is butchered on-site, with the premium oyster blade cut costing A$125; the tagliatelle with a rich mushroom and truffle sauce is equally satisfying. Don't miss the date tart for dessert—it's been a Rockpool favorite since 1984.

The creation of three Italian brothers, this trendy Paddington eatery is a winner for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The menu is designed to offer a genuine taste of Italian home cooking no matter what time of day you dine. At breakfast, a light polenta porridge arrives with figs. For lunch, a fresh caprese salad and dinner, their self-titled "best lasagne ever." You can even grab a takeaway, with a wide range of Italian baked treats which are baked on-site daily and good coffee.

This elegant, pillared dining room is the perfect setting for showing off chef Peter Doyle's modern, light touch with Mod Oz cuisine. Menu highlights include the prawn tartare and the aged pork loin with rhubarb, mostarda, and cabbage. Finish off with a dessert of intriguing tastes—Earl Grey ice cream with blood orange citrus curd doughnuts and blood orange sorbet. There's also a four-course chef's menu (A$160) and various two-, three-, and four-course lunch options, but no à la carte menu.

Found inside the Roslyn Packer Theatre, the Walsh Bay Kitchen offers light Asian fusion fare, with flavors of miso and wasabi-crumbed fish often found on the menu. It gets busy here before a show, due in part to the fact that the food here is so much cheaper than at neighboring restaurants. It's a pleasant spot to linger and enjoy a quiet wine from the extensive list when the crowds empty out.