JANUARY, IN BITES.

Old and new, Greek and Italian, Nordic and nice: 2025 is off to a good start.

I may have left my long-term gig reviewing restaurants for the Sydney Morning Herald recently, but you can’t resign from eating and drinking. And when you’re a writer, you can’t retire from writing.

What I didn’t expect is that I would miss telling people about it so much. Sharing all the good bits. Boring people legless about this new place to go, and what to eat when you get there, and what it says about dining today. It gave me a sense of purpose, and I miss that.

So here we go, in a different form, without scores and formats. Not reviews, just reports. Sharing good places to eat, mainly in Sydney, often in Melbourne, and occasionally, the World, on the last Friday of the month.

An occasional recipe, interview or book review, perhaps. I don’t really know, I’m still working it out as I go. (Suggestions will be taken and/or politely ignored).

In the meantime, here are some great new and old places that should go ping on your radar.

OLYMPUS DINING.

It’s rare to sit inside and feel outside, but Olympus Dining has a strong outdoors vibe, thanks to the 50-year-old bougainvillea and the retractable glass ceiling. It’s also rare to be a part of such a huge restaurant (220 diners) and not feel as if you have disappeared in the crowd. There’s a pretty hot service team on the job, and a kitchen designed to feed big crowds and small.

Sam Christie and Jonathan Barthelmess opened The Apollo in Potts Point in 2012, so they’ve had plenty of time to consider how they would approach a second Greek restaurant. That time and thought is patently obvious at Olympus Dining in Redfern’s we’re-going-to-make-Cleveland-Street-sexy-or-bust Wunderlich Lane precinct.

Young, Turkish-born head chef, Ozge Kalvo was previously at Baba’s Place. She and Jonathan tackle just about every Greek dish you’ve ever heard of, and a few you haven’t.

There is so much lamb. Grilled milk-fed lamb, and whole roasted lamb and lamb meatballs, and some other lamb I cannot remember, but I think I ordered them all. The lamb brains (next pic) are like crunchy, crusty chicken nuggets, only soft and creamy inside. And the kokkoresti – a bad-boy skewer of lamb sweetbreads and offal beloved of Greek grandpas – is refined and raised to dining-out status, rich and livery, like a soft terrine. Be still, my rising cholesterol.

Love the lemony tarama, served with village bread as opposed to pita. Didn’t love the grilled calamari strewn with seaweed; a bit of a chew. Going back for the wild weeds spanakopita, the grilled sardines, the barrel-aged feta, the rizagalo rice pudding and more inside/outside action. Wunderlich Lane, 2 Baptist St., Redfern olympusdining.com.au

THE NEW KILN, ACE HOTEL SYDNEY

Beau Clugston has landed at Kiln, on the rooftop of Ace Hotel Sydney, the latest step in a journey that saw him leave Australia to work with Redzepi at Noma, come back to help out with Noma Australia in 2016, go back to cook at Bistro Paul Bert in Paris, and finally open his own seafood restaurant in Copenhagen, in 2018.

It’s a typically off-to-the-left Ace move, as we saw when they appointed Mitch Orr as head chef when opening in 2022. Beau will move between Sydney and Copenhagen, with gun chef Isobel Whelan-Little tending the home fires.

I had a great meal at Iluka in 2019, and remember immaculate shellfish on ice, and lots of leaves… vegetables wrapped in leaves and scorched, leaves covering a giant grilled flat fish, leaves everywhere.

Kiln, too, is leafy. Leeks are wrapped in leaves and cooked in paperbark, sea urchin lands on a wasabi leaf; kelp cures fish, and spatchcock is mossy green with shiso leaf. Best dish: pork neck, pink and giving but scorchy-grilled, with sea-salty karkalla and mussel sauce. It’s very coastal, fire-driven, and local, yet with a breath of fresh air coming in straight off Nyhavn.

Something good happens when a restaurant has its own DNA – Kiln is sparky, with a creative crowd – yet is strong enough to accommodate a new voice in the kitchen. I think the Beau era will do well, because flavours are direct, punchy and somehow very Australian. “I’m not trying to do a new Kiln,” says Beau. “Just bring a fresh set of eyes, and take it to the next stage of its evolution.” 53 Foy Lane, Sydney kilnsydney.com Thanks, Ace Sydney, for the invite. Pics: pork and tartare, Nikki To.

BESSIE’S, SYDNEY

You go to Bessie’s to have fun, to catch up with mates, and to have good, hands-on, hand-made, fire-fuelled food without any fuss. Funnily enough, that’s exactly why good mates Morgan McGlone, Nathan Sasi and Sali Sasi opened it – so they could do the same.

Besides, their adorable little Bar Copains just down the road is heaving at the sides, a victim of its own success.

It’s a great fit-out, especially for those of us who knew the site as Christopher Hazell’s long-serving Chef’s Warehouse, the glue that held top Sydney kitchens together for 30 years. Check out the whisk door handle in homage, and prepare for the sight of happy crowds in a great double-height warehouse with a kitchen at its heart.

Sit up at the elbow-to-elbow Alma’s bar, or grab a table in the dining room (Bessie’s), and cover the table with small-plate snacks that all hit the spot. Lamb shoulder empanada, mortadella and bresaola made inhouse, and pipis with garlic toast. I ate so many snacks I didn’t make it to a big shared main course, but did manage a lovely dish of King George Whiting in a very summery tomatoey crab bisque. Not sure I will ever get past the snacks though, and that’s fine. 111-115 Albion Street, Surry Hills bessiesrestaurant.com

SECRET KITCHEN, CHINATOWN, MELBOURNE

If you’ve been to Secret Kitchen back in the day, go back. Now that Christine Yong has joined the team (from Lau’s Family Kitchen and Red Emperor), the vast dining room has come up to speed as Melbourne’s number one city-side dim sum palace. I still enjoy the Red Emperor that moved into the old Shark Fin House spot, but Secret Kitchen has more of the buzz, the crowds, the chaos. And Christine, shown here with my number one dim sum chum.

Go for har gau prawn dumplings, pai gwat (steamed pork ribs, shown), live seafood and durian desserts, and note the fabulous dumpling baskets that are square rather than round. 222 Exhibition Street. secret-kitchen.com.au

THE DRY DOCK, Balmain, Sydney

Balmain locals are onto it – the place is permanently packed – but this two-year-new incarnation of an old corner pub in Balmain still feels a bit under the radar by a wider crowd. It’s worthy of a detour for the well-run dining room, the pro-packed kitchen under Ben Sitton, and the clever, keep-the-people happy menu that knows what you want before you do.

They do great seafood platters, good steak frites, smart seasonal salads and chic desserts, and they do it for huge numbers, lunch and dinner, every day. No surprise that the owners -James Ingram and Mike Everett – have skin in the game. They put time into training, pay attention to wine and drinks, and have created a great mix of old-school pub and new-school brasserie that feels really solid. Going back in winter for a booth in the bar dining room next to the ski-lodge open fire. (Food pics Jonny Valiant) 22 Cameron Street, Balmain. thedrydock.com.au

TIPO 00, Melbourne

Tipo Doppio Zero changed everything for Melbourne. It said that you could concentrate on doing one thing well and make a go of it. Andreas Papadakis’ tiny pasta bar has been around since 2014, and has since become, Tardis-like, the face of a business that has grown next door and next-level, with Osteria Ilaria, pizzeria Figlia and Grana Deli.

I dropped in for an update, sitting up at the bar (best spot), with a very cool Theresianer Pilsner and a couple of good, somewhat muted, dishes, then - kapow - a completely mad, vibrantly red-sauced and green-relished lobster spaghetti that was crazy-rich and sea-deep.

Watch out Sydney, the team is opening their next restaurant – and their first in Sydney - in 2025, in what Neil Perry calls ‘the Margaret Precinct’, formerly known as Double Bay. 361 Little Bourke Street tipo00.com.au

MID AIR, MELBOURNE

The new Melbourne Place is a fun place to stay – especially if your room rate includes breakfast at Mid Air as mine did. It’s a very civilised start to the day up there, with St Remo coffee and a breakfast roll stuffed with eggs, bacon and hash browns, amongst a crowd as cool as cats.

It’s also extremely busy as a cocktail bar later in the day, so it’s doubly pleasing to be able to get in and relax before it gets into party mode. And I’m so there for Ross and Sunny Lusted’s new Portuguese-inspired Marmelo on the ground floor, but my pesky wife – culinary editor and restaurant critic for the AFR - has her dibs on it, and I’ve been told to keep off her lawn. Melbourne Place, 130 Russell St, Melbourne.

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I’ve bitten off more than I can chew here, so will wrap it up. Thanks to all for making this world a great place to eat in, thanks to Hugh Stewart for shooting my portrait (you’re amazing) and thanks to Jill Dupleix for helping me set this up (you’re amazing, too). It’s going to be fun. (There should be a Subscribe button round here somewhere that you can click on, to get the next report in your inbox, last Friday of next month).

Until then. Thanks, Terry.