It was once considered “Aladdin’s cave for gourmets”, but times have changed. There’s now a $21 smoothie apparently inspired by LA grocer Erewhon, bare shelves and Vili’s pies.
When David Jones unveiled the first food hall at its flagship Sydney department store in 1936, it was heralded as a sign of progress. A grand staircase descended to a 20th-century marvel of imported canned goods, cakes illuminated within fluted glass cabinets, and a “snack bar” with maple-wood booths and red leather upholstery.
Ninety years later, and the glamour has faded.
In April, David Jones partnered with Create Catering to launch the latest iteration of its food hall, Eat at DJ’s. The press release said the collection of eight artisan eateries was “designed to elevate the traditional department store food hall into a destination for considered, high-quality dining”. Instead, they seem to have created a marketplace of knock-off food trends, propped up by thin corflute signage.
Good Food visited the food hall to try the fast lunch options, independently and anonymously, three weeks after it opened. We ordered a $21 wellness smoothie that bore a striking resemblance to US celebrity Hailey Bieber’s 2023 favourite, sold at luxury Californian grocer Erewhon; received two slices of brisket sandwiched with rocket, sauerkraut and mayo in a hard ciabatta bun for $16 ($24 with a side of chips) at the ’70s-themed Retro Roast; and went to Swirled, a cafe which sold cinnamon scrolls with dry edges and doughy centres for $9, alongside an oversized purple acrylic snail by American designer Jonathan Adler for $2999.
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Rows of partially empty refrigerated shelves contained Vili’s beef and chilli pies, canned San Pellegrino drinks and Chobani yoghurt pouches. Diners sat on black plastic chairs. The signature strawberries dipped in warm melted chocolate were still available, still delicious, and now priced at $15 for a handful of strawberries, served in a little bio-plastic cup with a cardboard fork.
“The food hall represents everything we believe in, that premium dining doesn’t need to be predictable,” said Anthony Whitehouse, founder and managing director of Create Catering. The company is best known for catering events at the Australian Museum, Hermes and Rolls-Royce.
Sir Charles Lloyd Jones, the chairman of David Jones between 1920 and 1958, had surely not predicted this fate for the food hall he created as a centrepiece of his grandfather’s commitment to quality.
“Department stores were like landmarks in the city, they were built to impress people” said Michael Lech, curator at Museums of History NSW. “They spent a lot of money to create these great spaces that people would want to spend time in, and that included the food hall.”
It wasn’t the only dine-in department store, but David Jones stood out for its commitment to quality and luxury. “This floor will house the most modern display of food in Sydney,” The Daily Telegraph wrote at the time. “A man was sent round the world to accumulate a collection of attractive delicacies.”
When the Market Street store opened to coincide with David Jones’ 100th anniversary in 1938, its food hall evolved to include a nautical-themed quick-lunch restaurant called Davy Jones’ Locker. It was the tail end of the Great Depression, but the fitout featured travertine marble, revolving captain’s chairs, ship lanterns and illuminated portholes decorated with deep-sea friezes.
Attentive service was part of the package. By 1949, David Jones food halls employed more than 200 assistants, and by 1951, the Great Restaurant launched with Doulton china, silver tableware and musical afternoon teas.
“My impression is that there’s a strong affection and attachment to the brands of those major department stores that’s mixed with a disappointment about what they’ve become in terms of customer service,” said Sydney retail historian Matthew Bailey.
“But the flip side of that is, do consumers want to pay for that customer service?”
Today, the casual eateries include Retro Roast, Swirl Cafe, Celebration Cake Bar, Good Bagel, Cool Press Juice Bar and Pizzeria. There are two dine-in eateries: Pan Divino, an Italian restaurant and wine bar (with a second venue in Surry Hills), and Wok Bar, an Asian restaurant serving laksa, nasi goreng and dumplings.
I cannot tell you what the food is like at Wok Bar, but I have notes about the service. During our visit, there was just one waitress during the mid-week lunch rush, and she barely had enough time between ferrying dishes from kitchen to tables to look at me, much less take my order.
No problem. I used my phone to place and pay for a takeaway order on their website, returning 20 minutes later, as instructed, to pick up the signature fried rice ($19.90) and xiao long bao (pork dumplings, $12.90). After another five-minute wait, the waitress arrived. “Oh, you already ordered? Oh, you ordered online?” She then walked about 10 metres away, around the counter of the open kitchen, and loudly asked the chefs whether they knew Wok Bar took online orders.
They did not. Faced with another “about 15 minute wait”, I opted for the refund. The waitress didn’t know how to process one. She went to find a manager.
Retro Roast is billed as “a love letter to the … David Jones food halls of the past”. Whitehouse said its brisket is rubbed with spices, seared to hold a crust, and slow-roasted for 12 hours. It wasn’t bad, but the set-up evoked memories of stopping at a service station in the middle of a long road trip, peering through the display glass at a “home style” roast with overcooked sweet potatoes.
“Our prices are competitive, our iced long black is $6,” Whitehouse said. Swirl charged $7.50 for it, and the coffee tasted burnt, and was too bitter to drink. Three of us tried and failed to taste anything beyond soy milk in the strawberry cloud foam iced matcha latte. The cinnamon scrolls failed to approach anything near the quality independent Sydney cafes have been serving for the past year.
The $21 “muscle nectar” smoothie was beautiful to look at – a purple blueberry and banana concoction contrasted against abstract schmears of mottled blue and white. While the ingredients list (including blue spirulina, enzyme enriched clean casein protein, pure creatine) almost justified the price, the taste and texture did not.
It is a far cry from David Jones’ heyday. While Eat at DJ’s opened quietly, with a few paid visits from social media influencers, the launch of the $10.6 million Food Glorious Food in 1984 was described as “more akin to a movie premiere”, with red carpets, a live band and “champagne flowing like tap water”, according to The Sydney Morning Herald at the time.
That iteration became known as an “Aladdin’s cave for gourmets,” as Susan Owens described it for the Herald’s Good Living section. There were 80 varieties of mustards, 400 cheeses, and freshly baked loaves of bread lauded by Herald restaurant critic Leo Schofield. Customers still remember the grand wine room, the prawn cocktails at the oyster bar, and even the full-time hand carver on staff to tackle the hams.
“The food halls – the delicatessen, the gourmet foods from around the world – that is part of that cosmopolitan culture that department stores facilitated and marketed,” said Bailey.
“In the past, when they dominated retail trade, they were adapting from a position of strength. Now, it’s difficult because there is so much competition.”
The David Jones food hall began to lose its lustre at the turn of the century, as online retailers grew. Its investment in standalone food halls (FoodChain) lost $120 million before shutting in 2003. Celebrity chef Neil Perry came on board as part of a $100 million investment in the mid ’00s. By 2021, Roy Bagattini, then chief executive of South African parent company Woolworths Holdings, was telling investors the food halls were done.
“Our strategy for food with David Jones in Australia was unfortunately fairly flawed from the outset,” Bagattini said at the time. “I don’t think we will be out of foods in every sense of the word, but we are going to be doing it very differently … It is likely to be more on a concession basis.”
In December 2022, Woolworths sold David Jones to private equity firm Anchorage Capital Partners for about $100 million, having recorded an $84 million profit that financial year. In its most recent financial year, the department store reported a $95.5 million pre-tax loss. Anchorage has a five-year $250 million plan to turn it around. The company did not provide comment.
There remain glimmers of hope beneath ground. The pizza bases, bagels and pasta are made in-house, and the tuna melt bagel is good. Pan Divino offers the same garlic focaccia and cacio e pepe as its Surry Hills original. Importantly, the cake counter lives on.
Whether Eat at DJ’s makes it past its first year will say less about Create Catering than it does about whether David Jones still knows what it’s for. In 1936, the food hall was a reason to come into the city. In 1984, it was a reason to come back. In 2026, it may have become a reason to keep walking.
Bianca Hrovat – Bianca is Good Food’s Sydney eating out and restaurant editor.
