Aug 18, 2012 Restaurants
5 City Rd, City. Ph 309-9273number5.co.nz
Dinner Monday-Saturday.
Sometimes, fashions be damned, it’s just better to get it right. That’s the principle driving Martina Lutz and her flagship restaurant just off Symonds St. The menu is New Zealand classic, which is to say French-inspired Pacific Rim, lighter on the butter than the old ways might suggest, and welcoming of Asian highlights too. But essentially this is an old-fashioned benchmark restaurant: meat cooked to the optimum point of tenderness and flavour; vegetables chosen for their seasonality and complementary value; sauces that transform the dishes, correctly prepared and served. Service is attentive and experienced and the drinks list is a showcase for local wines, with shrewdly chosen imported highlights. A peg down from fine dining, but losing nothing in the process.
A favourite dish: Assiette of beef, with eye fillet, beef cheek ravioli, ox tongue and crisp marrow.
$$$$$ | D | V | FR | G | PR | CL | GB what’s this?
