Hello Year of the Rooster! Sydney has brought the festival vibe this Chinese New Year with giant zodiac lanterns, Asian artworks splashed across town and the cutest rooster macaroon you ever did see.

The Sydney Morning Herald Lunar Markets have their final weekend this weekend (get down there if you haven’t already!) at Pyrmont Bay Park. Hanging lanterns, origami workshops, stilt walkers and DJs abound. This is Sydney though, so all we really care about is highly instagrammable food made by the stars of the local culinary scene (which is quite ridiculous behaviour that I wholeheartedly endorse).

 

THE FOOD: Absolutely everything we put in our mouths here was darn delicious. But let’s break it down in order of tastebud joy. Despite being Japanese food mad, I only discovered YAKISOBA when my cousin cooked it for me two weeks ago, and the kewpie-covered delight that you can get at the Lunar Markets has cemented it as THE SHIZNIT. Thankfully there was a line for this dish or I would have thought the world had gone mad. Delish!

And then there is the aforementioned macaroon dish. SO CUTE – this is true, but also a collaboration of three great Sydney names – Black Star Pastry, N2 and insta sensation Baked by Andres (who brought the adorableness overload). Black Star brought their signature strawberry and watermelon cake, smashed it, let ice-creamery N2 put a grenache needle inside and stuck a patooti rooster on top. Tastes as good as it looks. We also loved the Esty’s Cantina Lazy Suzan – a vegan polenta, sundried tomato and basil sausage on a bun with other yum stuff.

We also sampled the Zagyoza black bean vegan + pumpkin and feta gyozas which were a truly tasty appetiser. We washed it all down with Sapporo beer, served in rockin’ black cups, which we brought home with us – is that weird? 

When the sun came down we meandered through the umbrellas and lanterns, or sat on a sarong listening to the tunes. It didn’t feel too packed, the atmosphere was friendly, and we will probably go again before the weekend is out. After all, we didn’t even have a chance to sample the cult status Bao Stop, Luke Nguyen’s Street Food, the Happy as Larry food truck or the black velvet rooster donut at Nutie’s Donuts.

Once our bellies were full, we wandered up into town and took a look at the artworks in the Galeries Victoria by some of Skymie’s fave Sydney artists Chris Yee and Stellar Leuna who created special works for Chinese New Year. Well played Sydney – I’ll be putting the Chinese New Year season in the diary for next year. I was going to say ‘pho sure’, but that’s Vietnamese you idiot, Katie!