Shuk and Salt Meats Cheese team up for Popina restaurant and rooftop bar in Sydney

It doesn't get much hotter in Sydney right now than Circular Quay restaurants and rooftop bars, and there is more on the way. Popina opens mid-October, in the Gateway redevelopment, which has already lured Neil Perry's The Burger Project. Not only will Popina nail both trends in being a restaurant and rooftop bar rolled into one, its owners pose one of the more eclectic pairings of recent years.

The two-level restaurant and rooftop bar, facing the Opera House and Harbour Bridge, is a co-production between Salt Meats Cheese and the team at Shuk in North Bondi.

The result of that collaboration is a menu and concept that sweeps Italian, Turkish, Lebanese, Israeli and Argentinian cuisines. Say, what? Popina's head chef and co-owner, German Sanchez, has the CV to pull it off.

Raised in Buenos Aires, he spent eight years in Milan and two at Shuk.

"Popina was an ancient Roman bar where a limited menu of simple and tasty food was served with a large selection of wines. It was a place for plebeians of the lower classes, criminals and slaves," co-owner Stefano De Blasi says.