Latest news with #TimeOutSydney
Time Out
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Not a drill: Aussie icon Nagi from RecipeTin Eats is hosting a lunch in Sydney soon
Now, this is exciting. Nagi Maehashi – Aussie icon, author of two record-smashing cookbooks (Dinner and Tonight), and the brains behind a seriously banging sausage roll recipe – is teaming up with Plate It Forward's Shaun Christie-David for a super special one-off Sydney lunch. Held at soul-warming Ukrainian eatery Kyiv Social – winner of Time Out Sydney's Impact Award 2025 – this edition of Mum Cha will see Nagi, her mum Yumiko, and RecipeTin's head chef Jean-Baptiste 'JB' Alexandre join forces with Shaun and his mum Shiranie to serve up a delicious eight-course meal to hungry Sydneysiders (hi, that's us) that celebrates culture, generations and stories. Guests will enjoy four shared dishes by Nagi, Yumiko and JB, and four from Shaun and Shiranie, plus a cocktail on arrival and free-flowing red and white wine. It's happening on Saturday, June 28 – kicking off from 1pm. And our favourite bit? Dozer, Nagi's beloved senior golden retriever, will also be making a special guest appearance. A social enterprise, Plate It Forward employs, trains and supports people from marginalised backgrounds and those who have experienced adversity (including refugees from war), shining a spotlight on their stories through their venues, including Kyiv, Colombo Social, Kabul Social and Kolkata Social. And as well as creating tasty, bulletproof recipes, Nagi is also passionate about supporting people doing it tough – she's the founder of RecipeTin Meals, a not-for-profit food bank that has donated more than 300,000 meals to Sydneysiders in need. So this is a beautiful collab in our books. Created by Shaun and Shiranie, Mum Cha is a monthly celebration of the women and mothers in life who inspire us – and a way to bring people together over love and a banging meal. Tickets to Mum Cha with Nagi, Yumiko and JB, as well as Shaun and Shiranie, cost $150 per person. They go on sale at 4pm today (Thursday, May 29), Sydney time. You can snap yours up here.
Time Out
6 days ago
- Business
- Time Out
A huge new thrift store (with 1000s of new items daily) has opened in Western Sydney
Sydney thrift shoppers, we've got good news. After opening their first Sydney store in Western Sydney's Hoxton Park back in May 2024, the global thrift superstore Savers has just swung open the doors to its second Western Sydney store: a huge hub stacked with clothing, accessories, home goods, and more in Auburn. Photograph: Supplied | Greg Adams Easily accessible via major highways, the new store is likely to become a must-visit for thrifters from all parts of Sydney – with thousands of new items arriving daily, and the majority of items priced under $10 (as averaged across all categories). The opening of the new store will continue Savers' sustainability impact, diverting more potential waste from landfill and expanding the brand's not-for-profit partnerships, with the Diabetes Innovation and Impact Foundation (DIIF) joining the retailer's growing network (which already includes Red Nose Australia, Diabetes Victoria and Wounds Australia). So what can you expect at the store? The stock will be different every day, but expect clothing for kids and adults, plus books, accessories and a heap of homewares. Photograph: Supplied | Greg Adams Can't get out west any time soon? Savers opened their very first 'thrift boutique' in Darlinghurst back in September if you're looking for a thrift shopping stop in the inner city. Stay in the loop: sign up for our free Time Out Sydney newsletter for more news, travel inspo and activity ideas, straight to your inbox. RECOMMENDED: Keen to go treasure hunting? Head to one of Sydney's best markets. Or keep it second-hand at Sydney's best op shops.
Time Out
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
We went to Vivid Sydney's Fire Kitchen – these are the 5 must-try dishes
Don't let the weather dampen your spirits, because Vivid Sydney – the Southern Hemisphere's leading multi-artform and lights-on-steroids festival – kicks off tonight, baby! Vivid runs from Friday, May 23 to June 14, and this year's bumper line-up is a cracker, featuring a totally free-to-explore light walk, a ripper music schedule at the Opera House and beyond, and my personal favourite part: lots of delicious things to eat and drink. (Hello, dreamy collabs with Michelin-starred chefs, laneway parties and even a pop-up roller skating rink next to a retro American-style diner.) Vivid Fire Kitchen – a flame-fuelled market held along The Goods Line in Ultimo – also returns, serving up fire-kissed eats to hungry Vivid-goers. Time Out Sydney got a preview of this flame-powered street – here is everything you need to know, plus my five must-eat dishes (and a few notable mentions). Hungry? Same. Let's dig in. What is Vivid Fire Kitchen? Part of Vivid Food, Vivid Fire Kitchen is a night-food market and street that's chock-full of vendors, stalls, bars and an outdoor kitchen featuring live cooking demos from the best in the biz. One thing they all have in common? All the dishes (except the oysters and ice-cream) have been touched by fire. At night, Sydneysiders can head on down during Vivid to eat their way through the tasty, diverse eats. Bring a group of friends so you can order a bunch of things and go to town. Where is Vivid Fire Kitchen? Vivid Fire Kitchen is held along The Goods Line in Ultimo, right behind Darling Harbour. It used to be an old railway line, but these days it's a public walkway. How do you get to Vivid Fire Kitchen? Leave the car at home – it's best to get public transport (either train or light rail) to Vivid Fire Kitchen. It's accessible from Central Station, where you'll walk through that long underground tunnel (Devonshire Street Tunnel). Follow this towards the city – the pathway briefly opens onto street level, but continue your walk underground, and soon you'll arrive at The Goods Line. Alternatively, you can catch the light rail and get off at the Chinatown Light Rail stop. From there, it's about a ten-minute walk. Who's cooking at Vivid Fire Kitchen? Vivid Fire Kitchen isn't just about eating – you can learn about the art of cooking over fire and take home some tricks to wow your next dinner guests. Throughout Vivid, there will be nightly demos from some of the world's best pitmasters and barbecue experts. Catch Aussie star Jess Pryles, American gun Nyesha Arrington, Oscar Solomon of The Apollo Group, Lennox Hastie of Firedoor, Annita Potter, the award-winning chef behind Viand, Paul Farag, executive chef of Aalia, Karima Hazim of Sunday Kitchen, Morgan McGlone of Bar Copains and Bessie's, Michael Rantissi, owner of Kepos Group, and many more. Talk about a five-star line-up. See more here. What are the must-eat dishes at Vivid Fire Kitchen? I'm so glad you asked! I was lucky enough to get a preview and ran around like a headless chicken to try as much as I could (and yes, I had to unbutton my jeans at the end). The good news? I reckon the offerings are even better this year. There are also a few bars to grab a drink, including one selling mulled wine. While there are plenty of meat-heavy dishes, there's enough to satisfy vegos and pescos too – plus sweet treats to end the night. Here are my five must-eat dishes, plus a few notable mentions: 1. Tandoori chicken tikka naan tacos at Pocket Rocketz These guys lured me in with their butter chicken jaffle – and I reckon you should order one of those too. An Aussie classic filled with slow-cooked butter chicken, perfumed with cloves and cardamom, and amped up with melted mozzarella cheese, it's nostalgic, delicious and messy all at once. But my dish of the night goes to Pocket Rocketz's naan tacos. Think: warm, charred naan topped with succulent chicken tikka, garlic butter, tandoori mayo, mint chutney, fresh coriander and more. A banging two-handed Indian party. 2. Flame-kissed skewers at Firepop and Hoy Pinoy I couldn't choose between these, so I reckon you should hit up both. Time Out fave Firepop is there in their signature red food truck, pumping out their yum meat lollipops: buttery Wagyu cubes with a garlic and salt crumb, and tender lamb skewers fragrant with cumin dukkah. So good. Then hit up Filipino barbecue legends Hoy Pinoy. My pick? Pork belly skewers in a sweet-sticky-sour banana ketchup glaze made from saba bananas – even better paired with a bright, citrusy calamansi and ube iced tea. 3. Sliced brisket and pickles at Burn City Smokers This is a fire-fuelled food market, so it would be remiss not to get some seriously good barbecue meats. Head to Burn City Smokers for their 14-hour smoked beef brisket, bolstered with a sweet-and-tangy barbecue sauce. Pickled veg balances out the glorious fat, and the side of creamy mac and cheese rounds out a hearty, yum feed. 4. Soft-shell lobster flatbread with crocodile bacon at Crustacean Nation Crustacean Nation, a seafood stall from Carriageworks Farmers Market, is slinging under-the-sea delights at Vivid Fire Kitchen. Begin with fresh, plump oysters from Pambula before their signature lobster flatbread. Fire-glazed soft-shell lobster from Tweed Heads is paired with curried slaw and shavings of smoky crocodile bacon (yes, really) on a soft flatbread. It's bougie, flavoursome and packs a punch. 5. Crème brûlée churro cone at Mr Spanish Churro If you thought France's silky crème brûlée and Spain's warm, doughnut-like churros couldn't get better, think again. Mr Spanish Churro is merging the two cult desserts – and the result is so good you could cry. Warm, sugar-dusted churro is curled like an ice-cream cone before being filled with custard. Sugar is sprinkled on top, then torched to create a thin layer of sweet toffee. Ridiculous.
Time Out
09-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Dosa Hut
✍️ Time Out Sydney never writes starred restaurant and bar reviews from hosted experiences – Time Out covers restaurant and bar bills, and anonymously reviews, so that readers can trust our critique. Find out more, here. When Google Maps recently revealed their list of Aussie restaurants with the most customer reviews, one name rose above the rest: Dosa Hut in Harris Park. That was all the convincing we needed – off we went, with empty stomachs and high expectations. We're in Harris Park, AKA 'Little India', on a Sunday and Wigram Street is where the action unfolds. Think chaat vendors, sari-clad women drinking cups of chai, men chatting in Hindi or Urdu as they chew paan, kids eating kulfi, families browsing mithai counters, and the unmistakable scent of spice lingering in the air. We arrive at Dosa Hut in time for the lunchtime rush. It's in a white weatherboard cottage-turned-restaurant like many of its neighbours in the area. We're met with a 'there's a 25-minute wait', so we plop down on the plastic chairs in the courtyard and watch an endless stream of Uber Eats drivers pick up their spicy parcels. Just under the restaurant's name we read the phrase ' Indian multi-cuisine' – and that's exactly what they offer. Unlike Chatkazz just around the corner that serves vegetarian-only street food, Dosa Hut claims to do it all: vegetarian and non-vegetarian, North Indian, South Indian and even Indo- Chinese. Soon enough, we're shown to our table and handed the menu. Grabbing our attention is a long list of dosas – I'm talking around 50 dosas ranging from the simple paper dosa to the perplexing 'purple orange masala dosa' and everything in between – rava lamb dosa, pav bhaji dosa, butter chicken dosa. After all, it is called Dosa Hut… The prices at Dosa Hut are very reasonable, with most dishes under $20. Ordering is done via QR code, so we click, tap and confirm – then settle in for a spot of people-watching. The food comes out in no particular order, as and when it's ready. But first, a warning: quite a few of the dishes are so spicy, you might need a fire extinguisher for your mouth. Our Indo-Chinese dishes are served first. For the uninitiated, Indo-Chinese (or Indian Chinese) cuisine was born in Kolkata when Hakka Chinese migrants gave their traditional dishes an Indian twist by using whatever ingredients they could find like green chillies and coriander. It's neither Indian nor Chinese, yet a fusion of both and is relished by Indians. At Dosa Hut, the flavours lean heavily towards the desi side. While the veg fried rice has that unmistakable umami flavour, it's more like a pulao. The chicken Manchurian gravy has chunks of deep-fried chicken served in a sauce that's fiery and garlicky. Luckily, reinforcements arrive in the form of dahi puri and drinks. The dahi puri is pure joy – puffed up puris stuffed with potato, onion, crunchy sev, cooling yoghurt and drizzled with two chutneys – mint and date-tamarind. You're meant to pop the whole thing in your mouth in one go, and when you do? Boom! It's a street food flavour explosion. Our drinks are equally delightful. While there is a well-stocked bar, we opt for non-alcoholic drinks. The mango lassi is creamy, not overly sweet and carries a warm cardamom flavour. We expected the jeera soda to be made fresh in-house, it came to us in bottled form, full of fizz – and nostalgia. Goli Soda is served in a Codd-neck bottle where you have to press the marble down to release the carbonated pressure before you take a satisfying swig. Ours is jeera (cumin) flavoured – refreshing, sweet-savoury and perfect for cooling the fire from the curry that's about to hit. And hit it does. From the north of India, Mughlai food is rich, creamy and full of flavour. This Mughlai chicken curry is not for the faint-hearted. We ordered it 'medium' in terms of spice, but someone in the kitchen didn't get the memo. While the chunks of marinated chicken were tender, the curry is intense. Let's just say the butter roti and the lassi disappeared very quickly to put out the fire in our bellies. And last but not least, the dosas. If you're new to dosas, think of them as thin, crisp South Indian crêpes made from a batter of fermented rice and urad dal. We play it safe with a cheese dosa and a Mysore masala dosa. Both are cooked to perfection – golden, with crisp edges and soft centres. The cheese dosa is all melty and gooey and is gone in a flash. The Mysore masala dosa has a mouth-tingling red chilli paste smeared on the inside along with a potato filling. We tear off bits of the dosa to dip into the accompanying sambar (a spiced lentil soup) and coconut chutney. Crunch, chew, repeat. Just as we're rubbing our very full tummies, we spy copper pots of biryani being served to neighbouring tables – steaming, aromatic and oh-so-tempting. Chicken 65 biryani, goat dum biryani, paneer biryani… if only we had room for more. Guess we'll have to order some the next time we're hankering after an Indian feast. Just as the reviews from repeat customers mention, the food at Dosa Hut is fiery, affordable and full of flavour – we'll be back for more. And the best bit? There are 25 Dosa Huts across Australia – so next time your craving hits, they're not hard to find.
Time Out
05-05-2025
- Time Out
Six NSW hotels were just crowned the best in Australia, including one hidden gem
Sydney has no shortage of stellar hotels. We've got our favourites, and so do you, with millions of travellers rating their top picks in Tripadvisor's annual Travellers' Choice: Best of the Best Hotel Awards. The 2025 rankings have just dropped, and 25 Aussie hotels scored a shout-out, with six of them right here in New South Wales. In exciting news, one charming regional gem in Orange even took out the win this year! To compile its best hotel rankings, Tripadvisor sifts through millions of traveller reviews from the platform's 1.6 million listings over the past 12 months. It also ranks the top picks in categories, including luxury, boutique, B&Bs, family-friendly, pet-friendly and all-inclusive. Leading the way as Australia's highest-rated overall hotel for 2025 is Quest Orange, which currently has a stellar 4.9-star rating from more than 440 reviews. Time Out Sydney's Food & Drink Editor, Avril Treasure, recently stayed at this regional gem during Orange Food Week – Australia's longest-running regional food festival – and gave it her stamp of approval. Treasure says, 'Quest Orange has 77 room options, ranging from studios to one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments – making it an ideal and affordable option whether you're travelling solo for fun or work, on a friend's trip, or away with the gang on a family holiday. 'It's walking distance to the centre of town, so the only driving you'll need to do is to the nearby wineries. Got a furry best friend? Quest also lets you bring your dog – just be sure to let them know when booking. As well as the modern, clean and light-filled rooms, I'm also a fan of the complimentary fruit and tea on arrival.' (Heading to Orange? We recommend hitting up Hey Rosey – winner of Time Out Sydney's Best Destination Award 2025 – while you're there.) Recently crowned one of the most beautiful places on Earth, Lord Howe Island is home to NSW's second-highest-rated hotel and the seventh best in Australia. With an impressive 4.9-star rating, Pinetree Lodge is loved by travellers for its easy beach access, lush walkways and beautiful cottages. Other NSW hotels to crack the top 25 include Quest North Sydney (11th), Black Gold Motel in the Blue Mountains (14th), Quest Bella Vista (21st) and The Grace Sydney (25th). You can find the full list of highest-rated Aussie hotels below, or browse through the other categories here. These are the 25 best hotels in Australia, according to TripAdvisor Quest Orange, NSW MACq 01 Hotel, TAS The Reef House Adults Retreat Palm Cove, QLD Quest South Perth Foreshore, WA Mount Lofty House and Estate Adelaide Hills, SA Emporium Hotel South Bank, QLD Pinetrees Lodge, Lord Howe Island, NSW Quest Perth Ascot, WA Treasury On Collins, VIC Royal Mail Hotel, VIC Quest North Sydney, NSW Zagame's House, VIC Kingsford Smith Motel, QLD Black Gold Motel, NSW Quest on Dorcas, VIC The Henry Jones Art Hotel, TAS Deco Hotel Canberra, ACT Goonoo Goonoo Station, VIC Laneways By Ovolo, VIC Avani Broadbeach Gold Coast Residences, QLD Quest Bella Vista, NSW East Hotel, ACT Quest Echuca, VIC Element on Coolum Beach, QLD The Grace Sydney, NSW
