All things old become new again. Well, perhaps not all, but chefs around the country have pulled out the defibrillator to spark new life into some of the most nostalgic icons of yesteryear.

No, they’re not growing mullets, or wearing shoulder pads or leg warmers; they’ve resuscitated true-blue dishes like prawn cocktail, potato scallops, sausage sangas, lamb chops with mint sauce (or cakes if you’re from Victoria) and even crumpets in glorious style.

When Bennelong reopened in 2016, influential chef Peter Gilmore ignited the first wave of retro food with breathtaking homages to the humble pavlova and lamington, while in the bar he uses old-school pikelets to ferry poached yabbies, lemon marmalade and cream.

Now, two years on, Gilmore has continued the retro rejuvenation at Quay with perhaps the best crumpets you could put in your pie hole. “The crumpets came about because I wanted to do a different bread course,” he says. “Crumpets popped into my head because I thought it could be interesting if I made them savoury.

“I played around with the batter and we ended up folding buckwheat and roasted barley through the flour. We worked on the batter three weeks straight to perfect it. I realised the crumpets were what I was looking for.”

He doubled down on the crumpet theme by serving them with truffles folded through cultured cream and placing the crumpets in a beautiful wooden box that mimics a toast rack.

Gilmore says the trend of revisited retro dishes is fine as long as it doesn’t become a gimmick or dishes are reinvented that weren’t particularly nice the first time around. “I don’t think anyone will be re-working apricot chicken,” he says.

“I think if something is good originally, then you have something to work with – but you have to modernise it.”

In Queensland, Black Hide by Gambaro at Treasury and Black Hide Steakhouse are both doing pavlovas for dessert. Gotham Grill on the Gold Coast is championing the classic Caesar salad and Hellenika – the delicious 100 numero uno – doesrice pudding for dessert.

In New South Wales, The Unicorn Hotel serves Jatz with French onion dip. There’s Neapolitan ice-cream at Canberra’s Otis Dining Hall and Continental Deli in Newtown, while Acme pays homage to the devon and tomato sauce sandwich with a baloney sandwich.

In Melbourne, the prawn cocktail has been perhaps the retro dish of the year, led by Natural History’s take, which is barely distinguishable from the original. At Iki Jime, meanwhile, in Shannon Bennett’s take on the classic, five large Mooloolaba king prawns are poached in a court bouillon and sprinkled with crumbled cured duck egg yolk, kombu, wasabi and finger lime. It’s stunning, but it’s not the only hat tip to Australia’s nostalgic food there – the menu also features Bennett’s seafood spin on the Aussie sausage sandwich. In fact, he takes retro food to new heights in three of his venues.

“We’re doing a crab sausage in a brioche bun at Iki Jime and also at Vue de Monde that takes on whatever seasonal seafood we have that month, and we cook at the table,” he says.

“The idea here is food can be sophisticated yet whimsical and fun. There is real skill in making a fish farce or what we used to call in trade school, back in the olden days, a mousse.”

Bennett is a big fan of the retro dishes popping up on menus because they celebrate who we are. “I think they are just being done better than what we are used to,” he says.

“Cumulus has had crumpets on for years and I love them. The slight yeasty flavour just reminds me of old-school bakery.”

“At Benny Burger we’ve had potato cakes  – what you call scallops in Sydney, because you charge more and fool us Victorians when we come up for fish and chips!” he laughs.

“They’re our biggest seller, we double batter them with Coburg lager batter out of a syphon gun so the batter is super light and crispy. They are addictive,” he says.

“Any more retro challenges, bring them on!”

Speaking of the potato-cake-versus-potato-scallop war, Sydney chef Josh Niland, owner of Saint Peter – the NSW del 100 numero uno – says his potato scallops are selling like, ahem, hot cakes.

“I used to ride my bike to school and we’d go past the same shop every day and they did one-dollar scallops,” says Niland.

“In year six they put it up to $2 with chicken salt. We were gutted, but it didn’t stop us buying them.

“Every kid has the potato scallop story. They’re delicious and they’re one of our biggest sellers by day,” he says.

“I think it’s great that chefs are now comfortable enough to make some kind of nod to Australia without being a bogan, and not making it a token or gimmick, but celebrating the beauty of these dishes.”

Niland does a scarlet prawn cutlet, and serves scones, too.

“Scones are one of my favourite things, but they can be heavy-handed. But there was a recipe from Australia called puftaloon, essentially a scone made from flour, salt and buttermilk that’s fried in dripping. It’s light, and almost like a pan-fried scone or damper.

“We’ve ended up serving it with the picked spanner crab and coral sauce dish and people love it.”

Meanwhile, at Rockpool Bar and Grill Neil Perry and Corey Costelloe are on a nostalgia trip, too. They’re serving lamb chops with mint jelly, after-dinner mints and even Ice Magic and ice-cream, too.

“I remember getting an after-dinner mint every time I finished all my vegetables at The Black Stump as a kid. And as for lamb chops with mint sauce, I actually had it after work the other day!” he laughs.

“It’s really just about embracing and celebrating the food of our childhood. And that’s what food is all about – great memories.

“I guess we’re re-living that,” he says. And so too are diners.