“If you’re unsure of what anything is, it’s probably a vegetable or a pasta shape.” It’s an accurate and amusing description by our waitress of the menu at Acme, which can be difficult to navigate if your pasta repertoire doesn’t extend further than spaghetti and bucatini.

At this hipster Rushcutters venue, a neighbourhood favourite, old-school Americana snacks like baloney sandwiches are found unapologetically alongside Italian-Asian mash-ups like strozzapretti coated in soybean sprout kimchi and gochugaru, Korean ground chilli. It’s a venue that takes hold of a trend and elevates it. While a negroni cocktail is now part and parcel of any restaurant worth it’s salt, Acme puts a spin on the classic with their white negroni: a superlative blend of gin, Suze (a Swiss bitters) and white vermouth. It’s a refreshing and creative interpretation of the Italian aperitivo.

On the topic of salt, the handmade pasta dishes are all on the heavier side of salted, which is noticeable when paired with sauces like fettucine with scallop boudin (sausage) tossed with a housemade XO. Orr turns carbonara on its head, pimping up macaroni with braised pig’s head and egg yolk, the silky slow-cooked meat clinging to the pasta and creamy yolk. It goes down in the books as a Sydney favourite.

This is a menu that feels familiar and unique all at once. Call it comfort food, call it dude food, Italian or Asian – it’s a restaurant without limitations, and it’s great fun because of it.

Must-eat dish: Macaroni, pig’s head, egg yolk