The Top 100 Restaurants Near Catalina Restaurant
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Rank 1. Catalina Restaurant
Modern Australian
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Rank 2. Gran Torino
Italian
Neil Perry's Italian restaurant in Double Bay is built around the aperitivo rhythm: Martinis and spritzes arrive first, then antipasti, housemade pasta, seafood, and steak. The beef program leans into rare Australian breeds, including grass-fed Chianina, cooked simply enough that the sourcing does the talking. Ranked 27th on the World's Best Steak Restaurants list, though the room reads more like a generous Italian trattoria than a temple to beef.
- World's 101 Best #27 · World's Best Steak Restaurants
- Australian Good Food Guide 12/20 · One Chef Hat
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Rank 3. Tanuki Restaurant Sydney
Japanese
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Rank 4. Saint Peter
Modern Australian
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Rank 5. Ursula's Paddington
Australian New American
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Rank 6. Civico 47
Italian
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Rank 8. Yellow
Vegetarian
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Rank 9. The Botanica Vaucluse
Modern Australian
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Rank 11. Franca Brasserie
Mediterranean
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Rank 12. Bistro Rex
French
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Rank 13. The Apollo
Greek
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Rank 14. Aalia
Middle Eastern
Open-fire Middle Eastern cooking in the Sydney CBD, where ironbark wood and charcoal from the Blue Mountains do the structural work rather than playing atmosphere. The kitchen pulls from Levantine and North African tradition, including medieval Arabic manuscripts, and the debt shows in the layering of spice rather than any museum-piece earnestness. It landed at number 14 on the World's Best Steak Restaurants list, though it behaves nothing like a steakhouse.
- World's 101 Best #14 · World's Best Steak Restaurants
- Australian Good Food Guide 15/20 · Two Chef Hats
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Rank 15. Figo Restaurant & Bar
Italian
Velvet booths, wine racks floor to ceiling, and exposed concrete that somehow pulls it all together: Figo is an Italian restaurant and cocktail bar in Rushcutters Bay doing the kind of old-school Roman trattoria thing Sydney never tires of. Pappardelle with osso buco ragu is the move, and the tiramisu arrives exactly as it should. A One Chef Hat from the Australian Good Food Guide keeps the regulars feeling quietly smug about their standing reservation.
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Rank 16. Cho Cho San
Japanese
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Rank 17. Kisuke
Japanese
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Rank 18. Fred's
Modern Australian
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Rank 19. 10 William Street
Italian
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Rank 20. ARIA Sydney
Modern Australian
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Rank 22. Porcine
French
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Rank 25. Takam
Filipino
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Rank 26. Restaurant Ka
Modern Australian
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Rank 27. Otto Ristorante Sydney
Italian
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Rank 28. Bennelong
Modern Australian
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Rank 29. Nel Restaurant
Modern Australian
Fine dining that occasionally serves fried chicken and doughnuts without any apparent shame. Nel runs a rotating 11-course degustation in a moody CBD room of exposed brick and open kitchen, where the theme changes entirely and regulars come back to see what the kitchen has cooked up next. The format is unmistakably tasting-menu serious; the attitude is something else. Three Chef Hats from the Australian Good Food Guide.
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Rank 31. L'Heritage
French
A converted Navy drill hall on a Mosman wharf, with national park on one side and harbour on the other, is doing a lot of the heavy lifting before the food even arrives. L'Heritage is a French bistro and brasserie that leans into the classics, escargot, beef tartare, duck à l'orange, dry-aged steak, cooked with Australian produce and served without the stiffness those dishes sometimes attract. The setting alone tends to silence the table.
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Rank 32. White Horse
Modern Australian
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Rank 33. Viand
Thai
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Rank 34. Haco
Japanese
Charcoal grilling and tempura in the same omakase menu sounds like a contradiction until you sit at the counter and watch the chef make it feel inevitable. Haco is a compact Japanese fine dining room in the Sydney CBD, built around a single tasting progression you watch unfold in front of you. The name means theatre in Japanese, which the room leans into without apology. It holds two Chef Hats from the Australian Good Food Guide.
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Rank 35. Lana
Italian
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Rank 36. Gildas
Spanish
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Rank 37. Allta
Korean
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Rank 39. Yoshii’s Omakase
Japanese
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Rank 40. Matkim
Korean
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Rank 41. Amuro
Japanese
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Rank 42. Kuro Bar & Dining
Japanese
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Rank 43. Restaurant Garaku
Japanese
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Rank 44. Prefecture 48
Japanese
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Rank 45. LuMi Bar & Dining
Italian
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Rank 46. Jane
Modern Australian
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Rank 47. Midden by Mark Olive
Indigenous Australian
Perched on the Western Broadwalk of the Sydney Opera House, this modern Australian restaurant draws on Indigenous food traditions that predate the building by a considerable stretch. Chef Mark Olive builds the menu around native ingredients, wattle seed, bush honey, pepperberries, saltbush, things most Sydney dining rooms treat as garnish rather than foundation. The Australian Good Food Guide awarded it a Chef Hat.
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Rank 48. Kazan Dining
Japanese
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Rank 49. arthur
Modern Australian
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Rank 51. Bessie's & Alma's
Modern Australian
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Rank 52. Armorica
French
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Rank 53. Nour
Lebanese
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Rank 54. Ito Restaurant
Japanese
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Rank 55. Spice Temple Sydney
Chinese
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Rank 56. Sydney Common
Modern Australian
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Rank 57. Restaurant Hubert
French
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Rank 58. Shaffa
Middle Eastern
Sandwiched between two heritage sandstone buildings down a Surry Hills laneway, Shaffa is a Middle Eastern restaurant and bar built around shared plates and a deliberately festive mood. The space pulls from the energy of a bazaar, all bold spices and low lighting, and it suits a long table of friends more than a quiet Tuesday. The Australian Good Food Guide awarded it a Chef Hat.
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Rank 59. Nomad Sydney
Middle Eastern
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Rank 60. Bar Copains
Modern Australian
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Rank 61. Infinity at Sydney Tower
Modern Australian
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Rank 62. PELLEGRINO 2000
Italian
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Rank 63. Silvester's Restaurant & Lounge
Modern Australian
A share-format Modern Australian restaurant near Circular Quay, Silvester's sits on a corner that's had butchers and serious produce on it for generations. The menu moves from smaller plates through to bigger dishes, building in a way that feels designed rather than accidental. The room leans convivial rather than hushed. An Australian Good Food Guide Chef Hat.
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A Surry Hills spot where Australian and Asian cooking get folded into each other in ways that feel less like fusion and more like a genuine point of view. The menu shifts familiar territory into something harder to categorize, which is either exciting or unsettling depending on your mood. The room is small enough that the kitchen's curiosity feels personal. It holds a Chef Hat from the Australian Good Food Guide.
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Rank 66. Restaurant Leo
Italian
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Rank 67. Besuto
Japanese
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Rank 69. Kiln
Modern Australian
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Rank 70. SOUL Dining
Korean
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Rank 71. Morena
Modern Australian
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Rank 72. The Blue Door
Modern Australian
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Rank 73. Wagyuto
Japanese
The restaurant takes its name from the Japanese word for a Western chef's knife, which tells you something about where this place sits, one foot in Japanese tradition, the other in the cooking-obsessed Sydney dining scene. It's a considered, sit-down Japanese restaurant in sleepy Clovelly, and the kitchen leans hard on local produce while keeping the cooking precise and unfussy. The kind of room where people are there to eat, not to be seen.
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Rank 74. Mr Wong
Chinese
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Rank 75. Bistro George
European-Australian New American
A European-Australian bistro a short walk from Circular Quay, Bistro George holds an Australian Good Food Guide Hat and pitches itself at the full range: solo bar snacks, work lunches, leisurely dinners. The menu leans on local produce and lands somewhere between Continental and modern Australian, with a wine list broad enough to keep both the table orderer and the sommelier-curious happy.
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Rank 76. Esteban
Mexican
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Rank 77. Mode Kitchen & Bar
Modern Australian New American
Polished wood, statement pendants, and banquette seating set the tone at this CBD bistro, which sits somewhere between a long working lunch and a proper dinner out. The kitchen leans Modern Australian, wood-roasting and slow-braising its way through a menu that reads relaxed but cooks with more ambition than the room lets on. An Australian Good Food Guide Hat for the effort.
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Rank 78. Mimi's
Modern Australian
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Rank 79. Eleven Barrack
Modern Australian
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Rank 81. The Charles
French
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Rank 82. Bastardo
Italian
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Rank 83. Maydanoz
Turkish
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A neon-lit basement off York Street designed to feel like a gambling den, which sets the mood pretty squarely. Hustlers. Syd is a shared-plates Asian restaurant built for late nights, with a menu that roams across the continent and a cocktail list that keeps pace. The Australian Good Food Guide gave it a Chef Hat. Come with people you like sharing with, and don't schedule anything early the next morning.
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Rank 85. R by Raita Noda.
Japanese
An open kitchen doubles as a stage at this omakase and theater dining restaurant in Redfern, where two chefs work in near-silence while guests sit close enough to hear the knife. The rain-inspired interior tilts quiet and contemplative, which sets the right mood for a meal built around precision and patience. Chef Raita Noda has been running omakase in Sydney for years, and this is his latest, most considered room.
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Rank 86. Ennui
Modern Australian
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Rank 87. Atelier By Sofitel
French
South of France cooking in a Darling Harbour hotel, with wine racks lining the walls and a menu that leans on local produce shaped into something unmistakably French. The kitchen uses coal and char alongside classical technique, so there's smoke and richness alongside the bright, coastal flavors you'd expect. A polished, unhurried kind of dinner, the sort where you dress up a little and nobody feels self-conscious about it. The Australian Good Food Guide awards it two Chef Hats.
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Rank 88. The Dining Room by James Viles
Modern Australian
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Rank 89. Palazzo Salato
Italian
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Rank 90. Clarence and V
Modern Australian
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Rank 93. Ibushi Robata Grill
Japanese
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Rank 94. Omakase by Prefecture 48
Modern Australian
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Rank 95. Loulou Bistro
French
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Rank 96. Bathers' Pavilion Restaurant
Modern Australian
Floor-to-ceiling windows frame Balmoral Beach from every seat, which makes the nautical theme feel earned rather than decorative. This is a fine-dining restaurant on the Sydney Harbour foreshore, all French blue linen and an open kitchen that spills into a lounge furnished with Moroccan rugs. The chef came up through Sixpenny, and the seasonal menu leans into the harbour setting without hammering the point. A 350-bottle wine list and two Good Food Guide Chef Hats.
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Rank 97. Public Dining Room
Modern Australian
Floor-to-ceiling windows look straight out over Balmoral Beach toward Manly and North Head, which makes the room feel less like a restaurant and more like a very well-catered boat. This is a relaxed fine dining spot on The Esplanade, serving a modern Australian à la carte menu with Mediterranean leanings and local produce. The Australian Good Food Guide awarded it a Chef Hat. Getting there by water taxi from Circular Quay is, apparently, a genuine option.
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Rank 98. BTWN
Modern New American
Darling Harbour views frame every table at this theatrical modern Australian share-plates restaurant inside W Sydney. The menu leans on local growers and coastal producers, with wild-caught seafood making a strong case for itself as the room fills and the energy climbs toward something noticeably louder than dinner. The Australian Good Food Guide awarded it a Chef Hat.
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Rank 99. Woodcut
Modern Australian
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