Best Restaurants – Sydney v Melbourne?
A common question asked by many in the food industry. Does Sydney or Melbourne have the best restaurants? There were the days when to dine decently one had to fly to Melbourne. When it came to restaurants, Melbourne had it all over Sydney. Fanny’s, the Latin, Maxim’s, Lynch’s, Glo-Glo’s, Mietta’s, Hermann Schneider’s Two Faces, Stephanie’s in that amazing Italianate boom period pile in Hawthorn, the venerable Florentino, the fabled Flower Drum – one was spoiled for choice. And the people who ran them were larger-than-life personalities.
Compared to Melbourne, Sydney was the Gobi desert of dining. Then something strange happened. Sydney took over. A bunch of brash, young chefs began to run kitchens, and the situation was reversed. It took Melbourne quite some time to realise what had happened to its reputation for the nation’s premier restaurants, the epicentre of stylish dining.
What happened was simple. Diners didn’t want that kind of style any more. They wanted to know who was in the kitchen, not who was on the floor pampering the patrons. The day of the celebrity chef had dawned and the flash chaps juggling the pans were the stars, not the proprietors who hired them.
The evidence is that Melbourne may be regaining some of the considerable ground lost in the last decade – when Neil Perry, Tetsuya Wakuda, the brothers Doyle, Mark Armstrong, Paul Merrony, and, most famous of all, Tony and Gay Bilson (both Melburnians, ironically), began getting all the attention and a hefty slice of international column inches.
Australia is producing some of the best young chefs in the world today. We are becoming more creative, fusing tradition with daring and a highly personal style? So you be the judge. Whether it’s Sydney or Melbourne leading the way today, do yourself a favour & hit one of our wonderful restaurants!
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