The February Hit List: Bad Hombres, Ria Pizza + Wine, Foreign Return, and More

Looking for a banquet-friendly Chinatown venue to celebrate Lunar New Year? This must be the place. XOPP is located on the mezzanine level of Kengo Kuma’s striking building: surrounded by 20,000 metres of timber strands, it’s roomy enough for the biggest of reunion dinners. Welcome The Year of The Ox with a menu that has plenty of Chinese dishes symbolising prosperity, luck and sweet futures – like prawn and pork golden coin dumplings, vegetarian spring rolls, liquid lava custard buns and whole coral trout steamed with ginger and shallots.

Dining status: open for takeaway, walk-ins and bookings.

Monopole has moved out and taken its 500+ wines to the CBD, while Ria Pizza + Wine has shifted into the old site of its sibling venue in Potts Point. With award-winning sommelier Nick Hildebrandt also overseeing Ria’s wine list, you can trust that you’ll get a glass (or bottle) of something good here. And to go with your Radikon or Arbois-Pupillin? Brent Savage’s inspired sourdough pizza: toppings include zucchini with pumpkin-seed pesto, Queensland prawns with saltbush and XO sauce, and anchovies artfully placed with “little beak” peppers – the resulting slices might remind you of an abstract Miro painting.

Dining status: open for takeaway, walk-ins and bookings.

The popular vegan taco joint has a new outpost and its launch couldn’t be better timed. Bad Hombres’s second venue opened at the start of summer, just blocks from Bondi Beach, so you might want to head here after a seaside dip. Ask for tacos filled with miso eggplant and pineapple habanero salsa, chipotle-spiced potatoes or “Baja” jackfruit. Or snack on charred corn flavoured with pepita powder and chipotle mayo. Venture beyond Bad Hombres’ take on Mexican staples, too: the vegan version of Peruvian lomo saltado – the classic beef stir-fry with French fries – is reimagined here with ultra-savoury oyster mushrooms.

Dining status: open for takeaway, delivery, walk-ins and bookings.

Torta pascualina was essentially a weekly presence in Elvis Abrahanowicz’s household. His mother would regularly make the Argentinean spinach and ricotta pie, which has Italian roots and is typically served around Easter. At Humble Bakery, you can often find it on the counter, with some Abrahanowicz tweaks (it’s thicker, there’s ricotta in the pastry, the egg’s cooked a little differently). The latest venture by the Porteno team also features a a Calabrian-style ricotta cake with watermelon and pistachio, the Basque cheesecake that was a dessert highlight at sister venue Bodega, plus sausages wrapped in croissant dough and seasoned with ‘everything bagel’ sprinkle.

Dining status: open for takeaway, walk-ins and bookings.

This busy izakaya off Newtown’s main drag deals in Japanese staples (sushi, sashimi, yakitori, chicken kaarage, ramen), but given its location near many meat-free eateries, it smartly includes many vegetarian-friendly and vegan alternatives as well. There’s sushi made with caramelised eggplant, and a take on Hokkaido-style seafood ramen that gets its flavour hit from charred corn, vegan chilli butter and ‘meaty’ king oyster mushroom slices instead of scallops. After couch-friendly options? Its range of Japanese burgers (which feature deep-fried lobster or eggplant katsu instead of typical patties) can be home-delivered.

Dining status: open for takeaway, delivery, walk-ins and bookings.

Siddharth Kalyanaraman has cooked for the Australian cricket team during its tours of India and, as head chef of Foreign Return, he wants to broaden expectations about regional Indian cuisine here. So at his new Surry Hills restaurant, he serves venison curry from Rajasthan, a dish favoured by royalty, while also presenting his spin on workers’ lunches (dabba). There’s an Australian accent on the menu, too: nandu kuzhambu (a curry that originates from the Chettiar traders of Tamil Nadu) is cooked with local swimmer crab, and he grills his chicken with Tasmanian mountain pepper.

Dining status: open for takeaway, delivery, walk-ins and bookings.

Located in a cottage that was built in 1866 and named after the owner who bought the estate in 1928, Percy Plunkett covers all types of brunch cravings. There are decadent offerings (deep-dish pancakes with caramelised banana and white chocolate mousse; French toast with cheesecake cream and toasted coconut crumble), apparently healthy options (the Mediterranean mushroom bowl, summer granola with vanilla panna cotta), meaty fare for carnivores (barbecued brisket, breakfast burgers) and something for kid-sized appetites as well (junior-sized waffles).

Dining status: open for takeaway, delivery, walk-ins and bookings.

This tiny eatery around the corner from Chatswood Station provides an unexpected portal into Hong Kong. There’s a cart-noodle menu, tofu desserts, grass jelly, and yin yeung. Order the latter in its classic form as the blended coffee-tea drink traditionally served at Hong Kong cafes – or better still, enjoy it as part of a mochi set (the peanut coconut and milk tea mochi flavours are also great). Lunar New Year is an especially apt time to order Sugar Cubed’s tong yuen with ginger soup or soy milk, as the rice dumplings represent togetherness and family reunion.

Dining status: open for takeaway, delivery and walk-ins.

The Pines Cronulla leans into its beachside location with a menu built around shorelines and coastal flavours. There’s angel hair pasta you can twirl through Queensland prawns and XO sauce, macaroni and cheese upscaled by lobster and fried South Coast squid served with mint and caper mayonnaise. And for any couple keen to take on the classic French seafood stew – an epic bouillabaisse that’s designed for two.

Dining status: open for takeaway, walk-ins and bookings.

At Aria, you can toast the Year of the Ox with extensive tasting menus, high-roller beverage pairings and a postcard setting by Sydney Harbour. Joel Bickford’s menu draws on Asian ingredients and local produce for culinary inspiration: grilled black marron from the coastline of Western Australia is served with sea urchin, kombu and a decadent dose of caviar, while raw pearl meat is turned into something special with a flourish of white kimchi and soy and burnt citrus dashi. There’s a dessert brewed from lapsang souchong tea and there’s a lucky envelope for any guests who opt for sommelier Alex Kirkwood’s top-dollar wine pairing.

Dining status: open for walk-ins and bookings.