Restaurants in Brisbane
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Three Monkeys Coffee House
A family business for 14 years, Three Monkeys serves it up supersized – piping hot coffee and spicy chai come in soup bowls. Hide away in the cosy den, or wolf down your chocolate cake on the bench outside.
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Fatboy’s Café
The $4 breakfast at Fatboy’s is legendary: eggs, bacon, sausage, tomato and toast served any time (add just $1 after 5pm). It’s easily the best value hangover cure in town and it’s located smack bang in the action in the Brunswick St Mall.
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Mecca Bah
You can't book at this swanky Middle Eastern-themed restaurant, but that's OK because it serves great cocktails while you wait. If you're with friends then choose a pile of dishes to share: the Lebanese sausages and chickpea battered mussels are particularly yummy, as are the lamb pizzas.
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Tibetan Kitchen
Launch into a variety of zingy curries at this colourful restaurant serving Tibetan, Sherpa, Indian and Nepalese food. For larger groups, the banquet is the way to go. Afterwards, the Brunswick St Mall nightlife is a short stroll downhill.
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Watt
At the southeastern end of New Farm, this friendly eatery and bar is part of the Brisbane Powerhouse theatre and arts centre, and serves up good, modern Australian cuisine. If the weather permits, try to get a table on the terrace and enjoy the riverside surrounds; otherwise the chic, subdued interior makes for a pleasant dining experience.
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Mondo Organics
Doubling as an organic cooking school, you know they’re serious about quality produce at Mondo. It’s an elegant, fine-dining set-up (think crisp white linens) where you’ll be served sustainable beef and lamb, or wild line-caught fish. Organic wines are served in Riedel crystalware: it’s posh with a conscience.
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Breakfast Creek Hotel
A stunning French Renaissance–style building constructed in 1889, the Brekky Creek is probably Brisbane’s most famous pub. It also cooks the best steaks in town (ask any local!); modern extensions to the old building offer excellent outdoor dining, perfect for demolishing a juicy grain-fed Wagyu rump.
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Gunshop Café
West End’s gourmet breakfast specialists churn out potato-feta hash browns by the hundreds, particularly on weekends when this upmarket retro place is crammed. How about vodka cured ocean trout with poached eggs? There’s great coffee, and a range of tasty beers and wines to wash it all down.
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Kookaburra Café
A gigantic 50-piece pizza, supposedly Australia’s biggest, is slightly oversized unless you’re in a group of 10 (or attempting a Guinness world record), so lucky there’s regular-sized pizza, pasta and salads here too. The outdoor courtyard makes dining in worthwhile.
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Little Larder
It's worth searching out this lovely café, and not just because it makes damn fine coffee. Try the thick French toast or pesto scrambled eggs and you'll soon understand what all the real fuss is about.
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New York Slice
New York Slice's enormous slices of tasty pizza are perfect for everyone from budget-conscious travellers to clubbers on their way home in the early hours of the morning.
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Verve Café
This cavernous bar-cafe-restaurant where the cool kids hang has work by local artists for sale on the exposed brick walls. Food is modern Italian – blue-cheese risotto, and goats-cheese gnocchi are the big sellers. There’s acoustic music on Thursday nights and DJs on Friday nights.
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Customs House Brasserie
Few restaurants in Brisbane have open-air settings quite like the majestic Customs House, overlooking the Brisbane River and Story Bridge. The Queensland prawn and crab tian with roasted tomato and avocado, and the seared scallops are divine options. Go on, splash out.
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Ben's Vietnamese & Chinese Restaurant
There's a reason people flock to this Asian diner at weekends and it's not just for the food. Up to 300 people come here on Friday and Saturday nights drawn by a shared love of spring rolls and karaoke. Everyone - and we mean everyone - gets up to sing.
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Vespa Pizza
No chance of a boring selection like the big pizza chains here: Vespa’s wood-fired varieties are certainly unique. Big sellers include the streaky bacon and red currant with camembert, and the cinnamon roast butternut pumpkin with dried chilli and feta.
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Continental Café
The ‘Continental classics’ menu is the popular pick at this busy European-themed cafe, including a delicious soy-lime chicken breast with coconut risotto and steamed bok choy. Tasty veg options include spinach lasagne with grilled spring vegetables.
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Sassafras
This delightful little cafe, great for vegetarian options, has good-value meals for those on a tight budget. Scrambled tofu on Turkish bread goes down well, or the goats-cheese omelette with roast capsicum and spinach will fill the gaps.
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Pandemonium Café
This is a fun '70s-style café filled with op-shop tables, battered vinyl sofas and crocheted cushions. Breakfast is served all day but there are also home comfort foods such as sandwiches, burgers, and bangers and mash.
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Govindas
Cheap and healthy Hare Krishna eats; expect to queue at lunchtime for the popular $10 all-you-can-eat vegetarian buffet. Smiley staff also serve snacks, salads and desserts.
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E’cco
A slick bistro set within a converted tea warehouse near the Story Bridge, E’cco has won dozens of awards for its innovative, gourmet cuisine. Field mushrooms with olive toast, rocket, parmesan, truffle oil and lemon is the staff’s recommendation from the menu.
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Iceworks
You guessed it: this place was formerly an ice factory (1926–96) and reopened as a swanky bar-lounge-restaurant in 2008 with cool light-blue-and-white modern decor. Coffin Bay shucked oysters or Szechuan spiced calamari are popular shared-food options, or sit back with your sparkling white and gaze out through the enormous bi-fold windows towards Suncorp Stadium.
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Garuva Hidden Tranquillity Restaurant & Bar
This genuine gem of the Valley restaurant scene has the ultimate chilled-out vibe: dimly lit private booths with cushioned seating are partitioned with white silk curtains. All dishes are the same price including the delicious lamb curry and warm Thai beef salad. The cocktail bar out the back is a good option if you missed out on a booking (essential).
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The Deli New Farm
Everything on the menu at this innovative, fully licenced restaurant is organic, including the export-grade meats. The urban timber surrounds provide a contemporary environment in which to savour wonderful meals made from the best produce on offer. The menu caters to vegetarians, vegans and the wheat- or dairy-compromised.
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Tukka
If you don’t mind eating animals that are on Australia’s coat of arms, this upmarket restaurant serves them up with flair. Emu and kangaroo fillet are mains, or for something lighter, chow down on the Tasmanian possum entrée. Tried crocodile? Here’s your chance.
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Burger Urge
A pint-sized gourmet burger bar with monster-size varieties; a popular choice is the lamb burger with grilled haloumi, caramelised onion, pesto and relish. Vegetarians devour the roasted aubergine burgers, with goats cheese and sun-dried tomatoes.
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