Ikaria Bondi — Restaurant in Sydney

Atmosphere lovely. Very beautiful very cool. . Despite being very very beautiful, the food is below-average, if you’re a foodie I wouldn’t recommend this place- this is the type of restaurant you go for the vibes per se.

We ordered the burrata with warm pita bread to start which was quite nice, the touch of strawberry was really well done and I actually really enjoyed this dish and was so excited for the next few meals.

The saganaki was next and I really didn’t enjoy it, the heap pile of dried oregano in the middle was unnecessary and the saganaki overall was unpleasant. But this is loved by many others so this may just be a me problem so take it lightly.

My problem lies in the mains- mushroom souvlaki and market fish which was snapper.

We tried the mushroom souvlaki, it was just awful. In a strange way it felt like it wasn’t meant to be eaten in that way, it reminded me of an uncooked mushroom sauce. No flavour and just very soggy and overall strange. Sure, order meat instead. However if you have a relatively small-ish menu then every item should be polished and cared for, but this item just really seemed bizarre.

The fish was way too small, extremely salty and had literally no flavour with just some unflavourful cooked tomatoes at the bottom. I wish there was an option where we can add recommended sides to the mains which is common in all ranges of restaurants

We spent about $120 for two which is normal for dinner (no dessert we wanted to leave) we left pretty disappointed and unsatisfied. I’m a local sydney foodie and have been my whole life, this may be one of the bottom 10 places I’ve been for food, it just lacked a lot of flavour and depth and have no clue how this falls in the mediterranean category. It’s more like gentrified mediterranean which I’m assuming it is…? I love greek and I love mediterranean but I did not love this place. I’m sure the owner cares and it may have been an odd day in the kitchen

Service was lovely and we had a very sweet and...

Came here with a friend yesterday and had a really good time. As soon as we got the menu, my friend realised the waitress was actually his ex coworker and she still remembered him, such a small world lol.

We ordered a few things: taramasalata with finger lime, kingfish crudo, grilled tiger prawns, and some pita bread. The taramasalata was awesome,smooth with a little crunch from the roe and lime pulp. The kingfish was also really nice, the dressing wasn’t overpowering the fish and had this nice light sour and sweet thing going on. Plus, they topped it with fried shallots, which made it buttery and crunchy at the same time. The prawns tho… honestly, a bit disappointed. Prawns were overcooked for this amount of price. Sauce was fine, nothing crazy. Calamari was alright too, but nothing I’d rush back for.

Not sure if some of em are made in-house or store bought but overall, we were happy and would definitely come back to try more.

Big shoutout to the staff too, super friendly and helpful. Some of them even offered to explain the menu and asked if we had any allergies, which was nice. The place itself has a really cozy vibe too, made it feel pretty chill and welcoming.

Since this place is in Australia, we weren’t expecting it to be 100% traditional Greek, they do have some fusion stuff like finger lime, labneh, hummus, n’duja, etc. But honestly, it still works and the food’s great.

Big props to the kitchen and...

Great food and good concept with the set dining menus.

However, we went with a group of 10 people and before saying „hello“ we were told that we have to leave in exactly 1h45m which completely destroyed the experience. Especially because the food took quiet a while to come out. About 20 minutes before our seating ended we wanted to order a bottle of wine which was refused at first and we were told to order glasses. Pretty rude. Food was carried away from the table while we were still eating and it felt extremely rushed and made us leave very unrelaxed. We were not even finished eating when our seating ended. I get that you have to make your revenue and one table won’t cut it. But we spent 1,5k $ and we should be entitled to a good experience. Either make it more expensive and have longer seating times or consider that a big group should have longer seatings as food will take longer and people might talk more and eat slower than eg a couple‘s dinner. Unfortunately we had a similar experience in the sister restaurant a week earlier. It’s a Sydney illness in restaurants and as a European I really appreciate to give people time to enjoy their food and company. We‘re coming to get fed - yes. But we mostly come to have a good time. Please consider...