Armenian-Lebanese eatery Zareh has been named Gourmet Traveller\u2019s restaurant of the year, in a category of the annual industry awards that has historically been dominated by European-leaning cuisine and fine-dining establishments.<\/p>\n
The restaurant\u2019s menu pulls from the Armenian, Egyptian and Lebanese backgrounds of co-owners Tom Sarafian and Jinane Bou-Assi: aish baladi (Egyptian flatbread) is made with flour milled in the Mornington Peninsula; kafta nayyah comprises raw minced lamb from Tasmania and Victoria; hummus is crowned with spanner crab.<\/p>\n
Zareh, which opened in Melbourne in August 2025, is named after Sarafian\u2019s paternal grandfather.<\/p>\n
Previous winners of the restaurant of the year award have included Saint Peter, Attica, Orana by the late Jock Zonfrillo, and Quay.<\/p>\n
\u201cI guess it\u2019s imposter syndrome because it\u2019s not fine dining, but we may be part of the new sort of scene that handles food [just] as well \u2026 but a bit more casual in their approach,\u201d said Sarafian, adding \u201cthere\u2019s a lot of really fantastic Arab restaurants in Australia\u201d.<\/p>\n
Referencing the Armenian genocide, Sarafian said the restaurant was \u201ca love letter from us to Lebanon, who opened their arms and their country to Armenia and went so beautifully to let us in \u2026 It\u2019s a cross-cultural celebration.\u201d<\/p>\n
The hummus with king prawns and spanner crab at Armenian-Lebanese restaurant Zareh in Collingwood, Melbourne. Photograph: Kristoffer Paulsen<\/p>\n
At the award ceremony in Sydney on Monday night, winners frequently referenced Australia\u2019s migrant history and how it has shaped the local dining scene.<\/p>\n
Beppi\u2019s, a 70-year-old Italian restaurant institution in Sydney founded by Beppi and Norma Polese, claimed the reader-voted \u201cenduring excellence\u201d award.<\/p>\n
In accepting the gong, owner Marc Polese paid tribute to \u201cthe immigrants that work alongside us and make this such a rich industry.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s been a lot of bad words said about immigrants lately in politics, and I just want to acknowledge those immigrants that have made our industry possible \u2013 my dad being one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Best new talent winners Saavni Krishnan and Aditya Suresh, from Melbourne\u2019s Saadi, said the award was recognition for their \u201cmodern Indian\u201d food as first-generation migrants to Australia.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to \u2026 show people Indian food is more than just a bowl of curry,\u201d Suresh told Guardian Australia. The menu at Saadi changes seasonally and currently includes sundarkala, a dish of hand-rolled wheat noodles from India\u2019s northern Uttarakhand state, topped with wild barramundi from the Northern Territory.<\/p>\n
Saavni Krishnan and Aditya Suresh from Melbourne\u2019s Saadi.<\/p>\n
\u201cBig\u201d Sam Young was named restaurant personality of the year for his front-of-house presence at Young\u2019s Palace and S\u2019more in Sydney, which he co-owns with Grace Chen.<\/p>\n
\u201cI came to Australia as an immigrant \u2026 As a kitchen hand, I was making $10 an hour, and that\u2019s my beginning,\u201d Young said in his acceptance speech.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeing in this room is absolutely a privilege.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chef and author Stephanie Alexander received a standing ovation when she accepted her outstanding contribution to hospitality award. As well as her legacy in establishing her eponymous restaurant Stephanie\u2019s in Melbourne in 1976 and her not-for-profit organisation, the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation, her seminal cookbook The Cook\u2019s Companion marks its 30th anniversary this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think what I feel is that I\u2019m so much older than everybody else,\u201d she told the audience.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love \u2026 that over my career I have been able to influence a lot of very young people who are now firmly entrenched in this amazing industry.\u201d<\/p>\n
Melbourne\u2019s Yiaga was named best new restaurant, while Christian Ryan of Aloft and Restaurant Maria in Hobart was named chef of the year.<\/p>\n
The awards ceremony also marked the 60th year of Gourmet Traveller magazine, which first went to press in 1966 as the Australian Gourmet Magazine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Armenian-Lebanese eatery Zareh has been named Gourmet Traveller\u2019s restaurant of the year, in a category of the annual…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":859117,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[64,63,134],"class_list":["post-859116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=859116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859116\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/859117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=859116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=859116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=859116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}