Claire O'Brien

I grew up in Bondi, which now has more tourists than locals, and I have been eating my way through the Eastern Suburbs ever since I was old enough to walk to the beach alone. The Sydney food scene is world-class and almost entirely unrepresented in what visitors eat. The coffee culture is serious — the flat white was invented here, regardless of what Auckland says — and the café-to-beach ratio in the inner east is probably the highest on the planet. I also know the rock pool swims that the tourists never find, fifteen minutes from the Opera House.