Stafford Road Wine Bar - Northcote Point

Stafford Road Wine Bar is easy to miss if you aren't looking for it. Tucked away in quiet Northcote adjacent to its sister store, Point Wines. Even the name is unassuming. A wine bar, after all, does not conjure up mental images of culinary excellence or a dinner destination. They are usually places that you stop off at en route to or from somewhere else. Nevertheless, Stafford Road Wine Bar has proven to be one of the best (if not the best) finds of the year.

Afternoon Tea at the Langham - Auckland City

Suffering from a strong case of the Winter Blues and with Labour Weekend and Spring too far away to contemplate, Eva and I were in desperate need of a bit of luxury to soothe a week of work related stress away. Our search for an afternoon of indulgence led us to the Langham Hotel in Auckland City for Afternoon Tea at The Winery.

The creation of Afternoon Tea is credited to Anna Maria Russell, Duchess of Bedford who purportedly invented the meal to fill the long gap between lunch and dinner. Some say she had this meal of tea, cakes and sandwiches delivered to her chambers in secret for fear of being ridiculed. However when she was discovered, the concept well received and caught on swiftly amongst the English middle and upper class. Whatever the origins, we owe her a debt of gratitude as I for one am always in favour of the creation of new meals.

Apadana Restaurant & Bar - Dominion Road, Balmoral

Auckland's Dominion Road is home to a wildly varying range of shops, scenes, people and cultures. Hardly surprising for a road that spans almost 7 kilometers in length and crosses 4 suburbs. Hardly surprising as well then, is the fact that the range of cuisine on offer on this road is diverse as the road is long. From Indian to Italian, Chinese to Turkish, takeaways to fine dining and everything in between. On this particular night, some friends and I were catching up over dinner at Apadana Restaurant & Bar, a Mediterranean themed restaurant on Dominion Road.

Rocket Kebabs - Mt. Albert

A hectic schedule at the moment forces me to write a very quick post tonight. Since this is a quick post, what better to review than one of the solutions to food in a hurry... the takeaway joint.

Takeaways don't have to be greasy, unhealthy meals. There are a few places around that serve up good healthy (or healthy-ish) food that's perfect for a quick convenient meal when the pantry's bare or you just can't be bothered cooking. Rocket kebabs is one of those places that showed up a couple of years ago (or thereabouts) in Mt. Albert opposite Rocket Park on New North Road.

Erawan Thai - Herne Bay

An impromptu decision to eat out on Sunday night had Eva, Mother and I on the doorstep of Erawan Thai on Jervois Road in Herne Bay. Having heard great things about this restaurant from Herne Bay locals, we decided it would be a good way to warm ourselves up on a cold and wet Auckland night.

Soul Bar & Bistro - Viaduct Harbour

Heralded as one of Auckland's trendiest restaurants, the uber cool Soul Bar & Bistro is supposedly the place to go for a spot of celebrity watching in Auckland. At least, that's what Metro magazine had to say in 2008, when it voted the terrace at Soul on a Friday afternoon, the "Best Time & Place for Celebrity Spotting". Soul can boast a host of other awards as well, including Winner of the Hospitality Association of New Zealand Awards for Best Restaurant and Excellence in Customer Service in 2009,  and Best Casual Dining (Metropolitan) Cuisine Magazine NZ Restaurant of the Year Awards 2009. The list is extensive and can be seen on their website's awards page. All this made for impressive reading, so I decided it would be the ideal place to treat Mother for a Mother's Day lunch.

The Turkish Cafe - Newmarket

Having spent a wee bit of time in that part of the world, I usually find myself somewhat disappointed with most Middle Eastern fare that we have on offer here in Auckland. Most restaurants and takeaways lack authenticity, some are over priced, and a few are just plain awful. So the first time I walked into The Turkish Cafe on Broadway, Newmarket, I was expecting more of the same.

I couldn't have been more wrong.

And so it begins...

Greetings and Salutations to you O great surfer of the web, and thank you for visiting my blog. As you can see, it is somewhat sparsely populated at the moment. And by "sparsely populated" I mean... empty. Hopefully, however it will not be that way for long. I hope, over time, to fill this blog with reviews of restaurants that I visit here in Auckland, New Zealand, and perhaps some beyond, should I venture forth into the wild blue yonder (or grey yonder as it appears to be at the minute).

I would take this oppurtunity to stress that I am no food expert, food industry professional or anything of the sort. I simply like food. As a result I hope this site will eventually be a restaurant review site by the average man for the average man. Will I achieve that? Only one way to find out...

And so, I hope you will return once I have managed to properly start my endeavours. Until then, take care, be safe and happy eating.