Think of omakase as 2022’s vibrant answer to degustation, which fell out of fashion a year or so back when more diners resolved to go out for good vibes as much as they did good food. It’s one of the most surprising trends of the year after many forecasters predicted that small, expensive restaurants would see their demise after the pandemic. Sydney apparently didn’t get the memo. Omakase is short for omakase shimasu, roughly “I’ll leave it to you”. A chef prepares each course, usually a morsel and traditionally a nigiri, and hands it over a counter to the diner. When done well it’s a beautiful, personal thing. In Sydney, three restaurants have shined a light on omakase in the best possible way. At Besuto in Circular Quay, 18 courses move one-by-one over the counter. As well as many perfect nigiri, there’s a pearl oyster blanched in dashi stock and added to chawanmushi then topped with salmon roe. At the immensely popular 8-seater Kobo, Korean-style omakase, Korean-born chef Jacob Lee is inspired by different places, ingredients, and allows them to guide his changing menu (his abalone claypot pictured). At Haco, Japanese for theatre, a 20-course experience focuses on tempura. Dishes involve truffle, lobster, and a dish of soy-marinated quail egg in tempura batter topped with caviar.

It’s the mainstay of the suburban Chinese menus we recall from our childhoods, a retro classic whose delicious oily crunch we remember fondly but that were rarely actually good. But now prawn toast has made a major culinary leap into some of our best and favourite restaurants. Throwback Chinese eatery Lucky Prawn within the Bob Hawke Beer and Leisure Centre is Marrickville’s most popular restaurant right now, and its prawn toast – golden fried, a little greasy and made with sliced white bread from across the road – has a lot to do with that. At Ms G’s, a crunchy slab of toast comes with a thick chunky prawn topping, a zigzag of yuzu aioli and herb salad. At Spice Temple it comes in dainty triangles, a little crunch and a little spongy, with sweet and sour sauce for dipping.

Butter is never just butter anymore. In any restaurant worth mentioning, it comes with some other descriptor designed to make it even more delicious than it already is. Cultured or churned with chicken fat, or kombu, or charcoal, pops of fish roe or finger lime, or anchovy. We’ve seen yoghurt butter with organic bread at Saint Peter in Paddington, guindilla pepper butter at Parlar in Potts Point, and at Ester in Chippendale a roasted oyster comes with chicken butter. Whoever skips the bread and butter in a bit to save room for other dishes now is seriously missing out.

It’s not enough to make carrot-top pesto and call yourself a no-waste restaurant anymore. The rising cost of ingredients and unreliable supply chains, as well as customers’ growing lust for a sustainable thing, has both inspired and forced chefs to avert food waste more than ever. Bar Re- sets out to address waste; down to the “leather” on its banquettes made from pineapple-leaf fibre. The tabletops, staircase and bar look like terrazzo, but are made from recycled milk bottles. Re- collects surplus food like mango stones and banana skins and turns it into food and cocktails. Josh and Julie Niland’s Charcoal Fish (pictured) pushes whole-beast eats in preparations like charcoal fish wings and Murray cod and Mount Cook salmon sausage rolls. Chefs are reaching deep into their creativity in a bid to address the climate crisis but also, it’s great for business.

Whether it’s because our other half is at home with symptoms or because we’re just fabulously solo, more of us want to go it alone when eating out and this year. Eating alone was once an awkward anomaly, and now it’s one of the primary drivers of growth in the Australian food industry. Restaurants are catering to our happy liberation, offering menus made almost exclusively of snacks, more bar seating or small tables with views to the kitchen for entertainment, and omitting the dreaded question; “Will you be dining alone this evening”. Sit at the long marble bar at Lola’s Level One in Bondi, snack endlessly, rubbernecking to get a glimpse of the ocean and all the couples who are having less fun than you. Our reviewers saw someone dining solo with the 11-plus course menu at Chippendale’s Automata (dining room pictured) recently, taking inspired eating and self-love to the next level.

Italian food, as a term, doesn’t really tell us a lot anymore. The dishes and restaurants inspired by Italy and its excellent regions, its spaghetti and pizza, its Mediterranean and northern flavours, are so varied and so numerous, and yet we still cannot get enough of it. The opening of Pellegrino 2000 (pictured) was one of the most exciting of the year, with acclaimed chefs Daniel Pepperell and Michael Clift in the kitchen and wine guru Andy Tyson on all things booze. In true Sydney style, the team borrows from Italy but know where in the world they are, and the result is stunning. The tang in the trippa fritta, a fried tripe and parmesan dish, is citrusy Sichuan-style pepper from Japan. A fritto-misto has a hit of Japanese dashi salt. There’s marsala sauce on the butterflied quail. It’s new, it’s delicious, and it’s worth the hype.

Interest rates are on the up, but that’s not going to stop Sydneysiders enjoying the finer things. Caviar is this year’s hottest ingredient, and it comes in many forms (Pictured: NOMAD’s caviar). At Mimi’s, where indulgence and luxury ingredients are part of the scene, a tin of sturgeon’s finest arrives on a side table, nestled on a platter of ice accompanying a bottle of frozen vodka. It’s served as a “bump”, the idea is to spoon it onto the snuff of your hand and let it sit there to warm. Pop it in your mouth, roll it around – do not chew – and follow with a shot of icy vodka. The bump also crops up at S’More, the new Castlecrag bistro by former Merivale chef Big Sam Young. There’s a caviar service at Restaurant Hubert, where Sterling caviar comes with buckwheat blini and cultured cream. There’s a “roe boat” here, too, involving sea urchin, trout roe, and an avruga tart. Caviar is offered at Parlar in Potts Point with churros, chive crisps, crème fraîche, and at Where’s Nick, the lovely neighbourhood wine bar in Marrickville, hash browns are bejewelled with salmon roe. If a bump isn’t enough, try the caviar tart at Mimi’s, where a tart shell is filled with scallop mousseline and topped with caviar, served with melted citrus butter sauce.

Anchovies are the little fish that could this year. Appeared salted and on toast, served in their tins with bread for dipping, folded with olives and pickled chillies to make San Sebastian’s greatest export, the Gilda – we love these at Continental Bar and Deli in Newtown. They come served straight up on a plate or finely chopped into our sauces and Sydney can’t get enough of these tasty little fillets. At Lola’s Level one they come ‘Cantabric’ with piquillos, while at Parlar in Potts Point there’s a Olasagati anchovy churro (pictured). At La Salut in Redfern, a salty cracker is topped with manchego custard, tomato and a single curl of fat Angelachu Cantabrian anchovy.

Stay for a drink or stay all night, many of our brightest restaurants seem to be telling us as we head into an era of snack resurgence. In Newtown, Continental Bar and Deli has a bistro menu that slowly slides from lighter and smaller starters into heavier dishes, allowing us to graze and order more and more depending on how the night goes, and we love it. Start with steak tartare, some charcuterie, cheese, tinned scallops, Parmigiano and gaufrette potato, some charred garlic toast with anchovies, the snacks are endless and delicious. At 10 William Street the soft pretzel with whipped bottarga is still the bar snack to be reckoned with, while the rising yakitori trend – we love Chaco Bar (pictured) – sees us snacking on sticks of chicken skin, thigh, liver, all night long.