Food City: Adelaide

It’s a city of 1.4 million people but Adelaide is also – in the nicest way – a big country town. It quite literally feeds off its surroundings; its food and wine scene is a love letter to the various regions of South Australia that provide the goods. On a recent visit to Adelaide, I felt like I tasted far more than a city – my palate got to know and love the things that are grown, raised and gathered across an entire state. Here are some highlights. 

Tasting Australia

Adelaide is known as ‘festival city’, and Tasting Australia is an especially exciting one for foodlovers. Across ten days, a plethora of events takes place across the entire state, and throughout, Town Square in Adelaide’s CBD is festival HQ. At Tasting Australia’s opening night party in the square, a trail guided ticketholders beneath elegant marquees and fairy light constellations to eight stations, at which renowned local chefs and the food and drink producers they love served canapes and paired drinks. Station one came out strong with a Never Never oyster shell gin martini alongside which we crunched on baby cucumbers filled with Port Lincoln sand crab, kimchi, finger lime and succulent. Station two’s work-of-art tomato tart paired with a splash of The Lane blanc de blanc kept up the benchmark. And so on – woodfire grilled nannygai skewers, baby abalone, spice-rich stir fried venison, strawberry and custard praline tart and more wonderful wine from various SA regions. Circle the opening night in your calendar for 2026. 

Central Market

Dating back to1869, this permanent undercover market is today home to 70 food and drink traders under one roof (a roof that boasts parking for more than 1000 cars, with the first hour free – applause for the town planners). Wander at leisure or book ahead with Food Tours Australia which offers a range of experiences. Our morning tour began with very good coffee from bistro SiSea at the front of the market, and finished up there too, with bubbles and Coffin Bay oysters – a si, si from me. In between, our guide introduced us to a diverse range of stallholders, with plenty of samples to enjoy. Silky prosciutto (and the prettiest tea towels) at Lucia’s Fine Foods, Algerian paella and sticky dates at Le Souk, sublime topped yoghurt desserts at The Yoghurt Bar. It was like walking through a live advertisement for South Australia’s bounty; I wanted to take it all home with me. If you don’t go to this market hungry, and wearing stretchy pants, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Central Market

Botanic microcosm

A brisk walk from the city through the university precinct brought me to Adelaide Botanic Garden, where at the Friends Gate, I met my guide from Bookabee Tours, Kokatha, Narungga, Kaurna and Adnyamathanha man Tjimari Sanderson-Milera. Tijmari took me to explore the garden through a first nations lens, on an Aboriginal Native Plants and Social History Tour. To the descendants of today’s Kaurna people, the garden would be a veritable ‘shopping centre’, as Tijmari put it – its flora and fauna providing everything from food and drink to tools, weapons, and housing material. Tijmari – who’s also keeping traditions alive through his own skincare business using native botanicals – showed me a side to a botanic garden I’d never before seen – sturdy trunks carefully hollowed out with fire to create a home, carved into to make a shield, tapped for precious water, or poked around in for grubs; sewing needles fashioned from the hidden insides of banksia flowers; and plants for seasoning cooking and treating ailments. If you can’t get out to explore more of this country, this tour in the garden opens a window to the wider land and its people.

You can further explore the culinary potential of this place at Restaurant Botanic, housed in an 1906 kiosk overlooking the verdant surrounds. Chef James Musgrave and team forage an impressive number of ingredients from the 51-acre garden to showcase in an intricate tasting menu with equally thoughtful drinks pairings – the non-alcoholic pairing is especially wondrous. The establishment is ranked among the best in the country. 

Aboriginal Native Plants and Social History Tour of Adelaide Botanic Garden

Head for the hills

You don’t have to travel far from the city to land in the fertile surroundings that supply its kitchens. Reachable within a 20 minute drive, Adelaide Hills is virtually an extension of the city and more of its food peak than its food bowl. Vines were planted there almost two centuries ago and it makes delicious drops from climate varieties including Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. We spent a day and a half tasting our way around the hills at cellar doors (BK Wines, Hills Collide), dairy doors (Woodside Cheese Wrights – do not miss the tangy, mousse-like Edith goats cheese), pubs, and restaurants.

Woodside Cheese Wrights’ Kris Lloyd

Nabbing a table on the leaning old verandah of the The Scenic Hotel, we watched the setting sun sink behind the city skyline while sipping on local craft beer and tackling plates piled high with  that Aussie pub classic, chicken schnitty. 

The Scenic Hotel at sunset

One of the best meals I’ve had this year was at Thelma, a tiny restaurant in Piccadilly where the tasting menu is both beautifully presented and almost absurdly generous, and bursting with produce grown in the region. There’s a quiet luxury to Ondeen, a 1851 homestead on a five-hectare farm, being slowly and surely transformed into a home of sustainable cuisine led by talented chef Kane Pollard. Over lunch in a sun-soaked corner of one of the restaurant's several dining rooms,  partner in the concept Deborah Kingsbury filled me in on some of the ways in which Ondeen is forging a closed-loop ethos. Here at the restaurant and its sister distillery, nothing will be wasted, excess and byproduct will be repurposed. The team looks to what they have, what it can be used for, and gets creative to close the circle. It’s a delicious approach broadly echoed by Adelaide’s wider culinary scene: a self-sufficient circle of deliciousness. 

Sublime beef carpaccio at Thelma

The kitchen at Thelma, with co-owner Tom Campbell on right

Starters at Ondeen

Adapted version of my story originally published in Stuff