Naru Yakitori

At the ground floor of a Little Bourke Street address, the charcoal does the talking. The kitchen works in the yakitori-ya tradition, skewers cooked over glowing coals, and builds an izakaya evening outward from the grill, plates arriving in a steady, shareable stream rather than in courses. Expect the full anatomy of the chicken alongside vegetables and seafood, each skewer seasoned simply and finished with the smoky precision that good charcoal work demands, with sushi and sashimi rounding out the range for the table. The mood is warm and social, pitched squarely at after-work drinks that stretch into long dinners, with sake poured generously and highballs doing the rest. There is nothing precious about it: the room trades on the honest theatre of grilling, the hiss and glow of the coals, and the easy rhythm of ordering another round of skewers because the first disappeared too quickly. Bookings run through the evening, and the format suits both a quick counter feed and a drawn-out group session. In a city thick with Japanese options, this is the straightforward, charcoal-first version done with care, modern technique in service of something old and unfussy.