Rockpool wins Australian restaurant of the year award

Sydney's Rockpool has tasted more success by taking out Australian Gourmet Traveller's Restaurant of the Year Award.

Rockpool received praise for its attention to detail and the inventiveness of Neil Perry and Phil Wood's team.

Dan Hunter of Brae in country Victoria claimed the chef of the year gong while Asian restaurants are the best place for a tipple, with Sydney's Billy Kwong awarded for its wine list and Raffaele Mastrovincenzo from Melbourne's Japanese fine-dining restaurant Kappo named sommelier of the year.

But the judges noted an extremely competitive field.

"Particularly fierce in Sydney as well," Pat Nourse, chief restaurant critic at Gourmet Traveller (GT), said.

"This year we had a lot of movement on the list... just by the fact that a whole bunch of really great restaurants had opened around Australia."

Across all the winners, Mr Norse noted indigenous cuisine was coming to the fore.

"One of the really exciting things about the Top End of Australian dining is how diverse it is," he said.

"They are all taking an accent from native Australian ingredients."

The revamped Bennelong at the Sydney opera House won new restaurant of the year.