Why am I this lucky? Why do I often have the luck that my customers are foodies as well? All the way to the other side of the world, just to meet my customers for the first time and to discover they are just as crazy about wining&dining as I am. So there was this new Greek restaurant just up the street, it should be amazing as they had heard. And they didn’t even know the Greek kitchen is one of my all-time favourites. And trust me, it was a s good as everybody promised! http://www.gerome.nz/

It really was some sort of Greek Fusion food, new style, in a sharing concept. Try all dishes and just share this beautiful experience. It was one to remember for sure!

So what did we eat:

• roasted cauliflower, capers, pomegranate, sour cream vinaigrette (delicious and simple, new and old together, heavenly)
• buttermilk pita bread, taramasalata, greek fava & capers, house olives, sumac
• shoulder of lamb, tahini yoghurt, pinenuts, compressed watermelon (Crazy chef, new invention for me), mustard leaf
• lamb sweetbreads, pickled grapes, white onion cream (delicious!)
• charred broccoli, white bean skordalia, preserved lemon, sheep’s quark (can life get any better, all Veggie dishes and all amazing)
• short rib of beef, papagalos coffee, northland honey, fennel, carrot, house pita (bit too dry for me)
• loukoumades, nutella, coffee ice-cream, hazelnuts (gained 3 pounds just by tasting…. and BOO Nutella….!!)
• palate cleanser. house sorbet (sorbet of Ouzo and cucumber…!!! Yihaa!)

First some pictures followed by my scoring points, and I will be as honest as I can be.

Love the open kitchen!

Always good, in Greece, at home or in Auckland, loved this Pita bread made of buttermilk!

Compressed watermelon, never ever had it, and it is so easy to make, the chef took me to the kitchen to show me how. So easy and so damn tasty, just try it at home.

Grilled cauliflower with pomegranate, so simple but eat at home type of dish. And also the black sesame seed covered sweetbreads, BOOM!

BOOOO Nutella ! (since I work at the competition….hahaha) But shit, this was as crazy good as it was heavy! Just had to try 1 or 2 bites from my good friends, so happy I did not order this because I would have finished it and would still be working out o loose all the gained weight. But it was good.

I had the simple but maybe better pallet cleanser, just ouzo&cucumber, simple as perfect.

Just a quick shout-out to the Dutch waitress called Amy who just could not stand still… And of course to my lovely customer, doesn’t he look happy? 🙂

Points (will be critical as always):

Food: Overall just amazing, big portions, variety of unique combinations and just a way of bringing all classical flavours in a new jacket (it’s a Dutch saying). Also al veggies perfectly “al dente” and I loved the watermelon and even better, pickled grapes! Have to make that at home now. Just the short rib beef was way too dry in my opinion, should be more moist and some plates had running sauce or dressing which messed up the beautiful composition for some of them… 8.8 out of 10

Cosiness: It was a full night and upstairs it was a bit crowded, I prefer more separation between guests…. having said that, I had fun neighbours so it was okay, but when you have annoying neighbours it could be worse… Also the lighting could be better. And the Unisex toilets are something I still have to get used to…Chairs were amazing, overall style of the restaurant was great, really had a wonderful night out. 8.6 out of 10

Staff: Had a blast! So much fun, so open and friendly, from chef to waitress, everybody was helpful and easy to communicate with (or is maybe everybody in NZ like that?) Just 1 small remark, after our “aperitif” the glasses stayed on the table too long, should be removed when empty… but still 9.7 out of 10

Price: Damnit, yet again I cannot pay… Again my customers insisted on paying and after asking 3 times I had to let them. No worries, will repay once they come over here. But looking at the menu, it was ver reasonable for this quality! 8.5 out of 10

Overall great and deserved score of 8.9 out of 10