Bills in Bondi is sizzling hot for summer

First up, Bondi is my home. It's also a place of push and pull, of geezers (probably estate agents) in fast cars and backpackers in camper vans and older generations with memories of sewage-filled water and life before bankers bought up unassuming streets of poorly built houses.

It worships the body beautiful yet brims with steroids, silicone and cocaine. Every inch of its compact bowl is watched by someone with dollars in their sights. Its beach is its soul and its waves its life force – and they are the only elements of Bondi life that cannot be gentrified, manipulated and controlled.

For all its green juice-drinking and downward dog-doing and eye-watering house pricing and hipster threads-wearing, Bondi does the Australian urban lifestyle very, very well – and Bills is absolutely no exception.

Bill Granger's pied-a-terres may have began in Darlinghurst and spread to Surry Hills, but Bondi, surely, is made for his style of breakfast-lunch-dinner theatre, when sunny mornings merge into long lunches, when early teas mingle with grown-up dinners. Hall Street is hopping and Granger's newest spot is the queueing epicentre of its brunching and dining heart.

They have a few 'all-day breakfast' options so I get to order my favourite no matter what time of day I visit.

Anna Flanagan

There is no Bills without the corn fritter and imitators are still pale in comparison. His breakfast crown is pretty much undisputed, so I thought I'd give his dinners a go. Providing you eat before nine, when the kitchen begins winding up (as with everywhere here – eat early or go hungry), dinners are the best ways to avoid the outpost's daytime queues, which have already become famous.

And you know what? Dinner's great. Really, bloody good. Big, messy tangles of coriander leaves sit beside a pile of softly marinated tuna, avocado and brown rice which is light and simple and thankfully not bound with the coriander for those who prefer to avoid the heavenly stuff.

Big, sticky, shining hunks of pork belly are coated with possibly the best pork belly treatment I've come across – fiery and sweet, its deep red sauce and soft meat are kicked into overdrive with a squeeze of lime, a big handful of peanuts and fried onion and lots of coriander and a mound of felty, big lettuce leaves to take the edge off.

KFC (Korean Fried Chicken) is hot and crunchy and fatty and everything it should be, although would have been better as an entree. Our table groans under all of the dishes, which arrive in one fell swoop. A velvety, almost-too-rich yellow curry hosts blobs of soft tofu and fried chunks of cauliflower and a tiny bowl of fresh coconut grated with apple form a milky chutney that is a pleasure of a pairing.

Our marsala snapper is rich and light, those deep Indian spices an earthy, herby palate switch from the Far Eastern flavours of our pork, curry and sort-of-sushi. It comes with micro-skinny slices of apple and a big pile of tomatoes in various stages of cookedness dotted with unapologetically big pieces of garlic. We drink a beer but the more urbane can opt for a good-looking cocktail (Bellinis are $16.50) or dip into the finely-chiselled wine list.

Scan the room and it's not your usual Bondi crowd – people clearly travel to come here, as has long been the way of this suburb. Waiters are a little meandering on the night we visit, so I can only imagine how things get on a frantic summer's morning when a crowd braying for brunch makes a nippers session look chilled out. On that note, a special shout-out to whoever designed the noise-dampening fit-out – the din never reaches overload (unlike two very popular places nearby), despite the packed room.

Desserts are many and look a treat, plus Bills' neighbour is disco scoop, aka Gelato Messina. I'd be game for a go at that stunningly successful Darlinghurst export to Bondi, too, if I wasn't so darned full.