The city's lockdown delayed Onzieme's debut by six weeks, leaving the restaurant's team scrambling to lay out finishing touches amid a shortage of labourers.

"We ended up having to teach ourselves a bunch of building things, that was challenging - but interesting," Mr Couttoupes said.

Being new on the scene had some advantages when the restaurant did open into the thick of the festive season, but it also meant financial support was out of reach.

"Because we were a new business, we weren't eligible for any of the government support grants," Mr Couttoupes said. "Which was really hard, because we had just engaged all of our staff."

Hospitality venues across Australia have been grappling with a dwindling pool of workers, intensified by border closures keeping visa holders from work in restaurants and cafes.

Mr Couttoupes said staff shortages hadn't impacted Onzieme, and that hospitality venues hadn't moved quickly enough to combat the long-term trend at play.

"I think there's actually been a longer term trend that hospitality probably should have foreseen that was accelerated by COVID," Mr Couttoupes said.

"Young kids starting off in the industry, realizing that it's actually pretty crappy when it comes to overall work/life balance, pay conditions and that kind of thing.

"And realizing that with COVID, they've got a chance to retrain, it's not too late to do that."

Taking on "creative rostering" to lighten the load on workers was one way Mr Couttoupes has adapted, but it will be a collective effort to build Canberra into a city which attracts hospitality workers, he said.

"Canberra does pose difficulties that Sydney and Melbourne don't have when it comes to staffing," he said, the neighbouring cities offering more experience and training at "big flashy restaurants".

"I'm definitely hoping at some point, people actually start looking at Canberra as a nice place to live, but also a good place to be a chef. Because it's a great place to be a chef, it's so open and so close to producers," Mr Couttoupes said.

Friday and Saturday nights are still drawing in bookings, but the restaurant is sitting at about 50 per cent capacity early in the week.

"Overall, I think bookings have dropped to about 70 per cent of what they were in December," Mr Couttoupes said.

The challenges of lagging consumer confidence, mixed with Omicron case loads still in the hundreds has meant begrudgingly implementing some "parameters" around the dining experience, Mr Couttoupes said.

The restaurant has had to take deposits upfront on certain bookings as well as opening with a set menu rather than a la carte, to combat some of the challenges of post-lockdown dining.

It also means considering rostering carefully: "If we're looking at 40 people instead of 80 people coming through on a night, we're now in a position where we've got less money coming in. We need to be careful about how much ... staffing [we have]," Mr Couttoupes said.

He said Canberra's high vaccination rates continued to be of comfort for businesses moving forward.

"I hope that people understand how important that is for small businesses as well," Mr Couttoupes said.

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