FANFARE - Farewell Golden Century Seafood Restaurant

Golden Century was an iconic meeting place and late night supper establishment in Sydney’s Chinatown on Sussex Street. Opened to 4am it was a natural meeting place for supper and cooked a range of classic high quality Cantonese delicacies. We all ate there. I went there most with my brother Arthur, also a chef. It was always opened and we always ordered the same dishes. It was a meeting place we loved and were familiar with. It made us closer and proud of Chinese cuisine in Australia.

Their influence on the hospitality landscape can be seen through the proliferation of XO sauce on menus all over the country, chefs eating their signature pippies with XO sauce, then thinking to reinterpret a version of XO sauce of their own - this is highlighted in Pat Nourse’s great Gourmet Traveller article - we say farewell to Golden Century this week, and mourn the loss of a very important restaurant. A victim to the pandemic and decline in foot traffic in Sydney’s Chinatown - a reminder to support your favourite restaurants and the hospitality industry with your constant patronage - if you don’t feed it, it doesn’t grow.