Overview
In Melbourne the World's 50 Best Restaurants award ceremony has just wrapped up. We can only imagine (and dream of) how delicious the Neil Perry-supplied canapés would have been, how many recipes were swapped with slurred handwriting, and how cheery (read: boozy) all those chefs are right now. But we assume two of the most cheeriest will be Ben Shewry and Dan Hunter, as their restaurants — Attica and Brae, respectively — have just been named in the top 50 in the world.
With the ceremony having just taken place at Melbourne's Royal Exhibition Building this evening (the second time the awards have been held outside of London), the two Australian chefs have had the honour of being placed in the world's best 50 restaurants while on home turf. Attica's ranking is pretty consistent with last year's results, with the Melbourne restaurant moving up one spot to 32 from 2016 (and regaining its 2015 ranking in the process).
However it was Brae, which is located in regional Victoria, that was the biggest mover this year — it moved up 19 spots to land at number 44 this year, cracking the top 50 for the first time. It was announced that last week Sydney's Quay placed at number 95, so it's a huge deal for Australia to have three restaurants in the top 100.
The top trio of restaurants for 2017 aren't staunchly different from previous years, but have been shuffled around a little. Last year's number one spot-holder, Massimo Bottura's Osteria Francescana, has been moved back to second place, to make way for last year's number three, Eleven Madison Park, to take the top spot. This sees Spain's El Celler de Can Roca move back to third place.