How To Outsource Christmas Lunch in Sydney This Year

Christmas is all champagne for breakfast, unwrapping presents and playing backyard cricket – unless you’re the one hosting. Then it’s filthy hot and the idea of preparing food for your entire family portends disaster. Sydney’s hospitality heroes are a few steps ahead of your Christmas panic: not only are a whole bunch of venues open on the big day, but many of them are doing finish-at-home feasts so you can still earn a few brownie points from your nearest and dearest.

From a lush at-home feast of beef Wellington, prawn cocktails and black forest gateau, courtesy of an inner-city fine diner, to more casual dining by the beach, here’s how to outsource your Christmas lunch in Sydney this year.

The Charles, Soluna and Poetica

The team behind hospitality group Etymon is pulling out all the stops this year: The Charles and Soluna are open on Christmas Day, but they – along with Poetica – are also all offering at-home feasts so you can enjoy a restaurant-quality meal without loading the fam into the car.

The Charles Brasserie’s three-course at-home menu serves four to six, and kicks off with prawn cocktails with Marie rose sauce. Other dishes include a scene-stealing beef Wellington with bordelaise sauce, rotisserie chicken, plenty of sides and a gorgeous black forest gateaux. If you plan on dining below the soaring ceilings of The Charles itself, you can expect a similar menu, but with dry-aged duck with a Christmas pudding puree for your main.
Book The Charles or order its at-home meal.

North Sydney’s Soluna, meanwhile, is doing a more relaxed take for home. It’s a cornucopia of prawn cocktail cups, cold cuts and crudites, cherry-glazed ham and individual pavlovas. In-house, it’s a similar menu and similarly low-key.
Book Soluna or order its at-home meal.

As for Poetica, it riffs on its MO of cooking over charcoal and wood fire for its take-home menu. Expect summer veggies with yuzu, followed by smoked ocean trout. The heavy-hitters here are the MB2 T-bone, a slow-roasted lamb shoulder and wood-fired cabbage, plus plenty of sides. And there are multiple desserts: black cherry tart, an almond dark chocolate toffee, bake-at-home gingerbread and mince pies.
Order Poetica’s at-home meal or email [email protected].

Ammos, Brighton-Le-Sands

Dig into a Greek Christmas feast from one of the city’s best-loved Greek chefs, bang on the Brighton waterfront. Peter Conistis’s Christmas Day menu at Ammos starts with a seafood platter (oysters, mussels, prawns and more), then moves into spanakopita territory. Mains include twice-cooked duck with sour cherries and slow-roasted lamb shoulder, before the meal closes with baklava pavlova and chocolate meringues.
Book online.

Kitchen by Mike, CBD

Kitchen by Mike’s fresh, wholesome food lends itself well to the traditional approach to Christmas. It’s doing an at-home set menu for minimum five people, starring chef-proprietor Mike McEnearney’s Sydney-famous sourdough, wood-roasted chicken, glazed Kurobuta leg ham, sides and cheese.
Order online for local delivery or in-store pick up.

Delta Rue, CBD

The city’s new diner Delta Rue – inside the recently refurbed Sofitel Wentworth – is going all out for Christmas, with a seafood spread heaving with oysters, sashimi, prawns and crab. It’s also carving up turkey and a rum-and-honey-glazed ham, with plenty of salads and desserts to keep spirits high.
Book online.

QT at Home

Forget hunting and gathering to feed your family: we recommend you make things easy on yourself by pre-ordering one of QT Sydney’s massive Christmas spreads. It feeds up to six people and includes multiple starters (salumi, olives, hummus, roasted cauli salad); an entire course devoted to seafood (prawns, oysters, smoked salmon); both turkey and ham; good sides; and three sweets to end on, including a pudding and a trifle.
Order online.

Promenade Bondi Beach

Promenade in Bondi has you sorted for any eastern beachside festivities. Book ahead for a set menu that includes plum-glazed ham, Moreton Bay bug schnitzel, cherry-and-clove-glazed lamb shoulder and a sake brioche dressed up with mango and sour cream mousse. Happily, the adjoining Beach Bar is open for walk-ins should you need a break from the family-based fun.
Book online.

The Winery, Surry Hills

Guests at The Winery receive a glass of champagne when they arrive for their share-style Christmas lunch – but the Christmas cheer doesn’t end there. Take a seat in its eclectic dining room or lush garden for Sydney rock oysters with scampi caviar, turkey ballotine, barbeque king prawns, a pavlova and other cracking Christmas dishes.
Book online.

Little Pearl, Manly

If you’re one of the many expats who live in Manly – or just fancy a Christmas lunch loaded with Asian flavours – turn to Little Pearl. Its 10-course menu offers a bevy of dishes, like oysters with finger lime, yuzu and chill ponzu; tiger prawn and barramundi dumplings; slow-cooked beef cheeks; and white chocolate and makrut lime cheesecake. Bonus: the menu includes 2.5 hours of drinks, plus a welcome cocktail on arrival. A merry Christmas indeed.
Book online.