Restaurants in Auckland

There are a decent amount of restaurants in Auckland to choose from and here are the ones I visited!

Soul Bar and Bistro

Our best meal by far was at Soul Bar and Bistro situated right by Viaduct Harbour. The restaurant offers beautiful surroundings with a large terrace area overlooking the Harbour, a modern but cozy restaurant area inside and a lounge for drinks and light bites.

We sat perched on the terrace with the sun beaming down on us which was absolute heaven. What made it even better were the cocktails we ordered! The Royal Garden with rosemary infused vodka, strawberry puree, lemon, vanilla, deutz rose was incredible and had the perfect amount of fruitiness and sweetness. The Dear Olivia with pink grapefruit vodka, lemon, mint, orange marmalade and ginger beer was so refreshing and a great aperitif.

The Food Menu!

Wow, there were just so many dishes I wanted. There are a large number of starters / sharers from sections including ‘toasts & breads’, ‘raw bar & oysters’, ‘salads’ and ‘starters’ and ‘soul classics’. We were recommended the Burrata, peas, mint, wild wheat sourdough ($26) and could not resist the Salt & pepper squid, lemon, almond skordalia, chilli oil ($20). What can I say apart from how amazing both starters were. Seriously, up there in the top burrata’s and squid’s I have had!

For main dishes we chose the Ricotta cavatelli, house made pork sausage, truffle ($32) which was a huge portion with large amounts of pork sausage. The truffle wasn’t overpowering, and the dish worked really well. We also tried the Savannah beef fillet, gnocco fritto, black peppered sauce ($40) which was very tender. The more unique accompaniment of gnocco fritto made the dish even more exciting!

We were full by this point but could not rest the EPIC looking desserts on the menu. Choices included pear and ginger pudding, butterscotch, yoghurt ice cream, gold leaf snickers bar parfait and vanilla bean crème brulee with apple crumble, rhubarb ice cream. How can you resist?! We were drawn to the Clevedon Strawberry pavlova, elderflower crème anglaise, yoghurt sable and we certainly not disappointed!

I could certainly see why Soul Bar and Bistro has been around for over 20 years! It offers the perfect venue for date night, dinner / drinks with friends or a more formal business lunch with amazing food, cocktails and services.

La Zeppa

La Zeppa is a tapas restaurant in Auckland situated in Victoria Park Market area. We booked through First Table who sell the first table of the night at participating restaurants for $10 and you get 50% off the food bill! A pretty good deal if you are happy to eat early, as most of the tables are a 5.30—6pm booking. First Table informs you that you have a 15-minute window for arrival or the restaurant can refuse the offer (which is reasonable!). We managed to get lost and were 10 minutes late but La Zeppa were completely fine with it!

The restaurant has a warehouse feel to it with high ceilings and dark colourings. As it was warm, we headed out to the large terrace which has several benches and cushions to chill out. You can even see the Sky Tower from outside!