{"id":37684,"date":"2026-10-08T16:56:27","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T16:56:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/37684\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T16:56:27","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T16:56:27","slug":"watermans-executive-chef-departs-as-menu-shifts-from-mediterranean-to-greek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/37684\/","title":{"rendered":"Watermans executive chef departs as menu shifts from Mediterranean to Greek"},"content":{"rendered":"

High-voltage Mediterranean snacking earned Watermans two Good Food chef\u2019s hats. Now, less than a year after opening, its executive chef is moving on from the venue and the menu is shifting away from its original brief.<\/p>\n

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Less than a year after Bentley Restaurant Group launched Watermans at Barangaroo, the two-hat restaurant has lost its star executive chef and shifted away from its broadly eastern Mediterranean food brief.<\/p>\n

Chef Darryl Martin cited diverging business perspectives and family health challenges as reasons behind his departure, while the Watermans website now references the restaurant as modern Greek dining, with a new menu to match. Gone are Martin\u2019s signature eastern Med dishes that found voice at now-closed Marrickville restaurant Barzaari before the chef was plucked to front the high-profile Barangaroo start-up.<\/p>\n

\"DarrylDarryl Martin in the kitchen at Watermans. Edwina Pickles<\/p>\n

Martin said his decision to leave was due to a \u201ccombination of personal and professional considerations\u201d, including his wife\u2019s recent health issues, which resulted in the diagnosis of a neurological disorder.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis disorder has left my wife no longer able to work, drive or safely be left alone at times,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis has put … pressure on our financial stability, requiring me to look at additional revenue streams. <\/p>\n

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\u201cThat, combined with different perspectives on direction and vision at Watermans, which I truly respect, I felt the time was right for me to pursue a different path. I have a great deal of respect for everyone involved and look back on my time there positively.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Watermans\u2019Watermans\u2019 large, leafy outdoor section.Edwina Pickles<\/p>\n

Bentley Restaurant Group owners Brent Savage and Nick Hildebrandt described the decision to change the menu as a natural move. \u201cThere was already a heavy Greek influence on the menu, and moving to an all-Greek offering is not a huge change,\u201d they said in a statement. \u201cWe see this as a positive evolution, and believe the new menu will be more focused, more elevated and Watermans will be a better restaurant for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the time of Watermans\u2019 launch in late 2025, Savage and Hildebrandt signalled they were fans of Martin\u2019s cooking at Barzaari. Hildebrandt said the combination of Martin\u2019s flavours with Savage\u2019s finesse and plating had created some early kitchen alchemy.<\/p>\n

Savage and Hildebrandt are seasoned operators at Barangaroo, having previously operated the award-winning seafood restaurant Cirrus, just a few steps away from Watermans, from 2016 until their lease ran out in 2024.<\/p>\n

As Bentley Restaurant Group has grown \u2013 it recently added Ashe, a contemporary South-East Asian grill, and bar sibling Vespertine, both in Sydney\u2019s CBD \u2013 to a group that includes Eleven Barrack, King Clarence and Watermans. <\/p>\n

\"QuailQuail skewer at Watermans.Edwina Pickles<\/p>\n

The duo has also been quick to recalibrate the hospitality group. In 2025, they sold the plant-based Yellow to the restaurant\u2019s long-serving head chef, Sander Nooij, and his business partner. Later in the year, they closed Monopole restaurant and stepped away from Brasserie 1930 at Capella Sydney hotel. In August, Bentley Restaurant + Bar closed.<\/p>\n

The two described the new strategy as \u201cpruning and preparing for growth\u201d by focusing on restaurants they have full control over, and venues of a certain scale and size. <\/p>\n

As for Watermans, Martin said he was grateful for the opportunity and proud of what the venue achieved, \u201cparticularly earning two hats and being recognised among Australia\u2019s Top 100 restaurants\u201d. <\/p>\n

The chef said he was already working on consultancy projects and working towards \u201copportunities that won\u2019t be considered until the new year\u201d.<\/p>\n

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High-voltage Mediterranean snacking earned Watermans two Good Food chef\u2019s hats. Now, less than a year after opening, its executive chef is moving on from the venue and the menu is shifting away from its original brief. Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":37685,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[260],"tags":[420,421],"class_list":["post-37684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mediterranean-restaurants","tag-mediterranean-restaurant","tag-mediterranean-restaurants"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/vive.im\/@dnc\/117406347018942687","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37684"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37684\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/restaurants\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}