Pre-dinner cocktails, or post-feed beers - whatever you wish to wet your whiskers with, it can be delivered straight to your sun lounge.
Lovers of Asian-style food in CBD Sydney always have an opinion on the best place for cheap and tasty eats in Chinatown: some vote for spicy at Mamak; others are partial to the Peking duck at the Golden Century. But when it comes to pre-dinner cocktails, or post-feed beers, those in-the-know seem to agree on one spot: Bar One at the Mandarin Club.
The bar is well stocked with everything from celebrity-favoured mineral water to all the ingredients required for a fruity aperitif. There's also a solid selection of Australian and international wines on offer, with enough drops by the glass to keep a non-committal vino fan skipping between labels for a session.
With your chosen poison in hand, decide to either slurp alfresco-style, reclined upon a sun lounge, or chill inside beneath the floating glass roof. No one likes to stand in a bar queue for 20 minutes, particularly if your seat is stolen by some other punter in the meantime, so the table service here is a major drawcard for drinkers.
And if the line of prospective diners at your intended dinner spot stretches halfway down the street, there's always the option of hanging around to graze on some tapas-style treats in the bar, or heading to onsite Satsuma for plates of shareable Japanese cuisine.
Liz Niland
